Seven-X (23 page)

“Yeah,” I answered. “You think I lost my edge.”

“I think you are blindly chasing something you want so bad, that you lost sight of your surroundings,” Billings warned.

“At least you knew what color jersey your opponent was wearing,” I told him bluntly. “I’m not sure who the bad guy is here.”

“You need wisdom. God says if you ask for wisdom, he’ll give it to you.”

“You love throwing the God thing in there, don’t ya? Little jabs whenever you see an opening. My hands are up, Rev. Give me a break.”

Billings then got up and said, “Sure. I’ll tell you my story sometime, when you’re ready. I’ll check with Dr. Haworth, and see if we can get you out of here today, okay?”

“Thanks,” I told him.

“Don’t forget me Rev, I been quiet! I was quiet!” yelled Curtis as Billings made his way out.”

Then I heard another somewhat familiar voice bark out. “Who’s the real quarterback, Eddie? Ready. Set. 
Blue 1. Blue 2. Red 3. Yellow 6. BHA. Yopa dopa! Hut! Hut! Hike!”

I could hear him scampering around the cell, banging and yelling,  “I’m fading back, looking for someone to take this and run with it. This is the Super Bowl Eddie. Want the ball? Wanna run with this?”

“Is that you Tyler?” I yelled over.

He stopped shuffling and whispered hard, “Tyler’s dead. But we keep him around to play.”

“Who is that?” I asked.

“Your friends Eddie. We’re gonna help you sort this out.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked trying to gauge who was talking.

Curtis pounded the bars again yelling,  “We’re talking about how we’re going to kill you!”

The other voice laughed sadistically, before saying; “Don’t you worry E.T. We all get it in the end. Get it! In the end. This place gives it to you one way or the other. Acacia Karoo. Anadenanthera peregrin,” he laughed as he sang those words out like an insane nursery rhyme.

“What the hell you saying?” I asked, trying to peer through the bars to see if I could see anyone.

“Yopo. Mopo. Nopo,” echoed through the cell walls. 

“What?”

“Yopo, Mopo, Nopo, Jopo, Cohoba, Parica,” he sang out again. 

“You’re babbling nonsense!” I told him.

Then I heard banging against the bars,  “Am I?” he said. “Or are the less intelligent, less informed of your species, unable to comprehend scientific data, and the chemical properties, of the things they are induced with. Mopo. Nopo. Yopo snuff. Get it!” he yelled!

“No!”

“No,” he laughed. “That’s because it’s inside you! Yopo, Jopo, Cohoba, Mopo, Nopo, Parica. All names for Anadenanthera peregrin fool.  Hallucinogenic plants harvested at the greenhouse, a mile outside this property. Who’s crazy now! You are… a… contaminated vessel. Get it now!”

“You saying I’m drugged,” I asked, feeling some truth to his insane ramblings.

“Your blood is contaminated. Tryptamine. Methylone, DPT. The levels are building up. You’re seeing things. Feeling nauseous. Agitated. You don’t feel like yourself anymore, don’t you?” he groaned.

“Yes,” I replied, sinking back in my cell.

“It’s only the beginning of the game, Eddie. Mere days for you. After weeks, years, then what do you do? What do you do when your senses deceive you, your mind plays tricks, and your soul is left bare trying to figure out what is really happening here! That is when…”

JOURNAL ENTRY:                                         

MONDAY DECEMBER 20, 2010 – 12:12 PM

… you realize the battery died. I finally had my audio recorder back and the battery goes dead and I have no replacements. Great! 

Somebody knows what they are doing because the microphone and camera on my laptop, have been disabled or removed. Nothing works. With no internet, no software, no backup, I’m exactly where they want me. Dependent on everything they give me to investigate and survive.

My friends in Ward D believe we’re lab rats, subject to chemical testing by genetic engineers, growing bio-foods and plants at a nearby greenhouse. Apparently, the greenhouse is about a mile east hidden away in the mountains. 

A small river leads to it, and there is a reservoir at the mouth, where the greenhouse and lab rest. This guy, this voice said he was a toxicologist, originally hired to examine postmortem cadavers and provide reports of various test subjects. 

The tests were conducted to decipher the absorption rates of various non-regulated chemicals and medicines, ingested into our food and water supply here. As he was ranting about the greenhouse, two security guards entered and cuffed me, then escorted me to a waiting room back in Ward C.  

As I was leaving I could hear this man scream in obvious pain. Maybe some other guards beat him senseless. I was just glad to be out.

About ninety minutes later, Dr. Haworth entered. His assessment was brief and to the point. I could stay in Ward C supervised, under observation, or return to my cell in Ward D. I will be given access only to my computer, and may write privately and without examination by any third party. I will be allowed outside with an escort at appointed times during the day. I no longer have my keys, my clothes, my personal possessions or my car. I’ve been fitted with a tracking bracelet, like the other patients here. 

And I was given an Uphir patient number and ID. This officially makes me a prisoner. There was no way to argue this with Dr. Haworth. He knew he had me and I was helpless. I want to kick myself in the head for not seeing it coming.  I pushed too hard to get information. I lost focus of the warning signs and drifted into the hunting zone, ripe for the kill shot. The only advantage from my perspective is that I’m in position to get the real story from the inside. I’m no longer on the outside looking in, but I need to figure out how to use this to get information, resources and hard evidence of what is happening here, then find a way home.

JOURNAL ENTRY:                                          

MONDAY DECEMBER 20, 2010 - 8:26 PM

I’m having trouble focusing. Every time I sit down to write, this wave of exhaustion hits me really hard. I go completely blank and stare at the screen, slowly losing control of my motor skills. Then my head falls back, and my eyes roll into my skull. I can’t see anything and I get light headed. 

I just roll my head around in circles, groaning and squinting to clear out the pain. The next thing I know I’m out and when I wake up its a few hours later.  This happened at least four times and I can’t remember anything that happened to me. Now its dark out and I feel that wave coming over me once again.

TUESDAY DECEMBER 21, 2010

JOURNAL ENTRY:                                        

TUESDAY DECEMBER 21, 2010 – 7:30 AM

I slept about eighteen hours total. I don’t understand it, but I must have needed it badly. All those sleepless nights added up. My body just broke down. I don’t remember dreaming or feeling anything last night. I was out cold. Sleeping like a baby.

But that was rudely interrupted when Ward C managing Nurse Regan poked me awake, and immediately began my orientation. This was one stone-cold, bitch. She laid it out straight with an attitude that matched her size sixteen scrubs. She’s a bit sadistic, like a demented Roseanne Barr. 

We didn’t hit it off and my jokes bounced off her like flubber. I must strictly adhere to her schedule and attend all my therapy sessions. 

Meal times are scheduled at 8:00 AM, Noon and 6:00 PM. We are escorted to the cafeteria in groups and must arrive at the front desk five minutes before leaving. Bed check is at 10:00 PM and wake up call is 7:00 AM. 

Remember the four S’s. No smoking, swearing, spitting or sex. Break one and you are going to the fifth “s,” seclusion. 

All scheduled activities are mandatory and I must be cooperative with staff and accommodate any requests for testing, whether verbal, written or physical. 

Violation of these rules would subject me to an undetermined time of seclusion, or permanent residence in Ward D. Violation of Ward D protocol is subject to administrative action; which may include, but is not limited to, permanent seclusion or direct admittance into Ward E. 

I should stamp that bitch with a “side effects may include tag!”

JOURNAL ENTRY:                                       

TUESDAY DECEMBER 21, 2010 – 10:35 AM

There is no doubt Dr. Haworth is committed to breaking me down, in every sense of the word. He’s testing me, pushing my buttons, seeing how far he can push me before I snap!

I reported to the nurses’ station for my escort to breakfast, but instead of eating I was escorted to the lab for more blood work, another physical and CAT scan. They want to look inside my head, read my mind, or at least the activity in it. 

Little hottie, Nurse Evans, clumsily prepared my arm with a tourniquet and prepared to draw blood. Her ditsy act was gone. She seemed serious, not flirtatious like before. Every answer was a straight ‘yes or no.’ 

“Please hold out your arm,” was the closest thing we had to a conversation.  She acted like she was a puppet of this hierarchy, under instruction. I wonder what she did to earn her stay here. 

Something in her eyes pointed to a deep-seated despair, a sense of loss. Her sexy smiles and cute bends were replaced with robotic, non-emotional gestures, focused on the task at hand. 

As the needle inched toward my veins, I tensed up and wanted to knock it out of her hand. I don’t trust them.  

What are they doing to me?  

Why do they want my blood again? 

The puncture through my skin was like a shot of adrenaline to my nerves. A rush of fury swept through me. But I needed to remain in control. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and tried to think about something positive as the needle found its way into my vein. I thought about Melody singing to me at Dimples, while I knocked down an ice-cold beer. 

I could feel the blood draining from my body, and my head felt light, but I kept concentrating on Mel, seeing her smile as she sang
Maybe I’m Amazed
 to me.  As the needle dug deeper, drawing my life source out, I hummed the song inside my head, “Maybe I’m a man. Maybe I’m a lonely man. In the middle of something, that he doesn’t really understand…” 

Then something happened…  

My senses heightened again. I was completely on alert. My ears focused sharply on people talking outside the door. They were nervous as they picked up supplies from the next room. I heard one woman say they needed to protect the baby. The baby was in danger. 

Then I heard, “Get prayer warriors up there and surround him.” 

I had no idea what she meant, but something major was going down. Their footsteps were rough and the door closed hard as they left. 

The needle slid out of my skin and Nurse Evans taped a cotton ball over the hole. “Press hard,” she told me, finally breaking a smile, which brought me back to thoughts of Mel. 

I hope she got my videos and notes. I hope she made it to Carl and got my check. Money would help me a lot, take some stress off us. Then it hit me. 

I remembered it clearly. 

Curtis turned down my bribe with a frown that spoke volumes of truth. 

“What am I going to do with money, Eddie,” he said. He wanted the liquor. Something he could touch, taste and use to forget what I’m about to experience. And that is a frightening reality.

Those thoughts clung to me as I slid into the CAT scan. Pretty soon the thumping sounds began. The knocks, the rhythmic clicks of a machine peering through me, as I lay motionless in this cocoon.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap                                           

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.                                          

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

The sound transported me back into the seclusion room, hearing drops of water pound into my nerves like nails. I was trapped in a cocoon and the developing monster inside me kicked, like a fetus in a pregnant woman. 

I could feel my stomach burst in waves of pain, bubbling with gas, indigestion, or something worse. My fingers began to tremble and I could hear the nurse asking me to hold still. My heart rate spiked and I started panting. I was fighting to maintain control, but all I could see was this beige tomb of fiberglass that engulfed me. 

The tomb wrapped around me forming shapes, moving as if I was being swallowed by a serpent. 

My head was inside it’s mouth, slowly melting, as the acidic toxins of the snakes belly burned into my skin liquefying me, so I could be completely digested into its body and nourish him.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.                                       

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Those nails are beating at my nerves. Crucifying me inside the serpent’s belly. My legs began kicking and I could feel hands grip them and voices telling me to stay still. I see mounds of intestine engulfing me. Holes beginning to form on my skin as the acid burns through. 

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. 

Each vibration opens deeper holes, drawing out my heart, soul and mind. It was all leaving me as I disappeared into blackness. Everything became dark and quiet and a distant fire burned flesh that I could smell. 

Maybe that scent from Ward E never left me, or maybe it was growing inside me. Maybe I smelled my own rotting corpse expanding within me. 

This was the smell of Timothy Tyler, the walking dead. Was Cotard’s syndrome spreading through me too? What if it was contagious? What if it was harvested? Genetically engineered.  What if it was created in a lab to destroy an enemy?