Alex (clockwork) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2019-06-13 22:11:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | #december 2017, alex, alex x jane, jane |
Who: Alex and Jane
Where: The library
When: Mid-morning, Sunday 17th December 2017
Status: Complete
Despite telling Fin he was ready to give up on uncovering his mother's mystery, Alex was back at the library on Sunday morning. Fin was right about spending less time obsessively focused on it but he couldn't give it up completely. His goals needed to change though, that much was obvious
He'd been naive to think he alone would be able to uncover the whole thing like he was a one man Wikileaks but he still needed answers for himself. He didn't even know of what she could do had a name.
The library was quiet when he arrived and didn't get much busier while he sat at their computer. He had his own laptop at home but he always found he got more done outside of his apartment and the library was the perfect place to ‘accidentally’ run into Neil again, though he hadn't seen him yet and soon stopped looking as he settled into his research. Within an hour he had half a dozen tabs open on the browser citing various details and a bunch of notes scribbled in an open notebook by the mousepad. He paused to lean back in his chair and stretched his arms over his head before he rolled his shoulders and stared down at the running list he'd made in the upper corner. The next item was ‘Dr Rebecca Alden’ but something about researching his friend's mom felt dirty and after a moment's hesitation, he entered dream invasion into Google instead.
Jane didn't spend much time at the library unless she was there to bug Neil directly. But today she decided to look into a few things about Point Pleasant itself, and the nice thing about these small towns is they usually did a pretty good job archiving. There was plenty to be found on the Point Pleasant Six, but Jane was more curious about what the residents thought of the AIR fire so many years ago, among a few other things. She hadn't seen Neil today, which meant he was either scheduled off, or he saw her coming inside and ran to hide. In any case, Jane was walking by with a small notepad scribbled with archival numbers to look up on the library's database.
She spotted Alex almost immediately, and from the looks of it, he appeared quite busy. Not that it ever stopped her from interrupting people while they were working before. Jane approached, a tentative smile on her face. "Alex," she said. "This is so weird. I just assumed you lived at Joyland." Not really, but the only times she had ever seen him in town was when she went in for a coffee.
Alex had never considered there were others who could manipulate dreams before but he’d found stories of others online. Most of it related to old myths amongst different Indigenous cultures but it wasn't completely unheard of either. He'd found one site about astral travel; it didn't quite sound right but it was the best modern day reference he'd found so far and was so engrossed in the article that he didn't hear anybody near him until she spoke. He gave a slight jump as he sat up and looked around. Without the context of their usual meetings, it took him a moment to recognise her but when he did, he gave her a smile. “Jane, hey. That’s weird, I thought you only ever went out to get coffee.” He glanced at the computer screen but it was scrolled down to a wall of text describing the author’s personal methods and without a visible headline, it didn’t look too conspicuous. “Unless it’s really me you're stalking, in which case good job. You found me.”
Jane's brows rose for a moment before her smile widened. "You figured it out awfully fast. I went to get coffee but you weren't there, so I've been spending most of my day tracking you down. I don't think I can trust another barista to make my coffee quite like you do." It was natural to be curious about what he was looking up on the computer, but Jane didn't want to be rude by flat out staring at the monitor. "How have things been? Have you been able to find out anything more about your mom's case?"
Alex liked Jane. They didn't always get a chance to talk beyond polite pleasantries but when they did, she paid genuine attention and he appreciated her asking about his investigation. He gestured vaguely to the computer screen and spun the chair to face her properly. “It's what I'm working on now actually. And no, not a whole lot really. I think I'm just going in circles.” The computer next to him was empty so he nudged the chair out from under the desk with his foot. “Here, I can't make you coffee here but you can still stare at me like a creep if you want. How have you been?”
Jane moved to sit down beside him, resting her notebook on the table beside the computer. "I'm pretty good at creeping, so this should be no problem," she said. She wanted to read what he had so far, or what he might be researching. She didn't know how beneficial Alex could be for her, and the other AIR subjects she had met, but he had potential. "I've been fine, actually. I've met some people who might be able to help you," Jane continued, lowering her voice a little. "Other people who went missing here and returned. I don't know if it will give you any answers about your mom, but you never know."
“Really? I've met one but he doesn't want to help.” Alex instinctively looked around to check if Neil was nearby but when he wasn't, he leaned in closer to Jane too. “But he remembers which is more than my mom ever did. Well, kind of. It's complicated…” He'd considered tracking down specific returned cases but the realisation most probably wouldn't remember had meant he'd never even looked up specific names. He'd come across a couple but that was only when they were still missing, never returned, and he had no idea if they were even connected. There were just as many disappearances reported that didn't match what he knew. “Who are they? How'd you find them?”
"They found me, actually. Well, one of them did," Jane said with a small smile, thinking of Vex in the grocery store. "He knew who I was even though we never met. He gets... visions, I guess? Of people from... well..." She trailed off and sighed. Jane looked around just to make sure no one was lingering or milling about. "I was someone who went missing as a child. There was a fire and we escaped, me and a handful of others. This was after your mother, obviously. I'm guessing that the one who doesn't want to help you works here?" It had to be Neil. Neil was the only one she had met so far that wanted to keep his head buried in the sand and pretend nothing traumatic had happened to him at all.
Alex’s eyes widened as Jane spoke and wheeled his chair closer to her until their knees were touching. There were others, she was one of them, somebody had visions? That was a lot to process. “Um… wow. Okay. I’m not sure where to start with that. First, yeah, he works here so I guess that means you know him too. I always wondered if he knew more than he admitted.” He wondered if he should be more paranoid about the timing of this confession. So soon after an AIR employee (former AIR employee) found out he was looking into things was probably suspicious but he'd seen Jane around for months before that and it wasn't as if his work was the best place for this kind of conversation. He decided he just had to trust her and hoped it wouldn't prove to be a mistake.
“Second, uh, you're going to think I'm crazy but I need you to look at something first.” He reached down to the backpack by his feet and pulled out an A4 sketchpad. He flicked through, turned it to landscape and handed it to Jane. It was a crude sketch of a large room with a table in the centre. A small child was on a chair too big for her, her feet off the floor and at the other stood a larger figure in a long coat and short, greying hair. Her face was hidden by her hair but the doctor’s simple features were menacing, even in the simple style. On the table were a number of poorly drawn shapes on the table, needles and knives being the easiest to make out. A large window was on the wall behind them while shadowy figures hidden behind the shading watched. Alex wasn’t an artist but the point was clear and while there were a million other things he wanted to ask Jane, he decided knowing that his mother hadn’t imagined it was probably the most important. However silly it made him feel, he needed that external validation. He watched her anxiously. “I know it’s not very good but this… does this mean anything to you? Was it there?”
Jane couldn't exactly say Neil knew more than he admitted. It really seemed like he didn't know much at all, simply because he had spent so long denying things. But hopefully that was changing. She watched with restrained curiosity as Alex pulled a sketchpad out of his bag. Her heartbeat quickened as soon as she took the sketchpad in her hands and saw the drawing. She wasn't the little girl, but the scene itself was a familiar one. Neil would probably have a coronary if he saw something like this.
Taking a breath, Jane looked up at Alex and nodded once. "The room looks familiar. The
window." She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, her gaze back on the sketch. "Who's the girl? Your mom?"
Alex's heart thumped and a lump formed in his throat. So it hadn't been some crazy delusion she'd made up. It was such a relief to finally have somebody else who knew the truth (and didn't deny it) that he wanted to ask a million questions and compare notes for hours. Unfortunately, he was well aware the library wasn't the best place for that and time was limited.
"Yeah, I guess it is. She used to, uh, describe things to me. There's others in there, if you want to look. They're not very good though, I just wanted to get them down while I remembered them." Most of them were vague scenes that could be anywhere if you didn't know where they were set and he wasn't a good enough artist to really portray any specific staff member but they had enough detail to get a sense of it. "It might not even be the same as you remember. She disappeared in 79 and then one day, poof, she was back on the side of road in clothes that weren't hers and no idea where she'd been for the last three years."
Jane nodded and looked through the rest of the sketch pad leisurely. She was an artist and she wondered what Alex would say if she showed him some of her work. It was morbid and unsettling, but so much of it came from memory. Or dreams of people she had found. "They wipe memories," she murmured, keeping her voice low. "If they find the abilities are no good to them, they erase everything and release them. I mean, that's what they usually do. But... I've been finding that's not always the case. I only got away because of a fire that burned the whole place to the ground. They either lost track of me after that, or had no clue who escaped. But there's more of us here than I initially thought. I don't know if there's a reason behind it, or if its coincidence." She tended to think it was the former, but Jane didn't want to delve too deep into her theories.
Alex watched Jane flick through the different scenes he’d sketched out. Each one told a similar story - scientists, isolation, experiments - but they were crudely drawn and the details didn't make much sense to him. He'd seen them but he'd never been there and he wondered how it looked to somebody who had. How much of it was real and how much had been exaggerated in the dream world? "Yeah, that memory wipe doesn't always work either. I mean, it did for her, kind of, she remembered something at a subconscious level but it's hard to explain. There's ways to unlock it…" His eyes darted to the computer screen then back to Jane and he offered her a small, thin-lipped smile. "If you don't mind me asking, what happened that night? Do you know what caused the fire?"
Jane drew her gaze away from the sketches to Alex's face. She knew what had happened, but she wasn't entirely sure she was ready to tell him about it. She believed Alex's mother had been involved with AIR as a subject of some kind, but she couldn't say she completely trusted Alex. Obviously she did enough to talk to him and tell him the truth, but the fire itself... that was something else. "I don't remember much. I was young," she said. "Something happened in one of the rooms, maybe it was electrical, I don't know. But we all saw our chance to get out and we did. It was a powerful fire, but I never found out how it started. I know that's probably not the answer you wanted, but it's all I have right now."
"No, it's fine, thank you," Alex said with a shrug. He hadn't bothered to dwell on the why itself; he was just grateful it had happened and a generation of kids and teens didn't go through the same thing. Hopefully he could keep it that way. "I actually met somebody who used to work there. I have no idea what to make of her and she says if was boring social science stuff but of course she'd say that, wouldn't she? She's a doctor now." He still wasn't sure what to make of Mike's mom but as distant as she was, he couldn't picture her torturing kids.
That piqued Jane's interest, especially if the woman was a doctor now. She would be easier to track down. "She works at Mercy? Are you sure she's not working at the facility anymore?" No way did Jane believe in the 'boring social science stuff'. Unless the doctors there thought experimenting on children was boring. That wouldn't surprise her, actually. "Does she knows about your mom?"
Alex felt bad for throwing Mike's mom under the bus. There was still a part of him that wanted to believe she wasn't a part of it and even if he couldn't truly convince himself, he didn't feel right telling somebody else. Especially not somebody who had reason to want justice from anybody who was involved. It was something he could easily understand but she was still Mike's mom. "I don't know where she works now," he lied. "And she wasn't there when my mom was. I think she was just out of college so maybe they didn't give her clearance for that stuff."
Jane hummed thoughtfully in her throat before looking down at the sketches in her hand. She closed the book then and offered it back to Alex. "Would you want to talk to the others I met? If I can find a time to get us all together? I think they might be interested in what you have to say, or what you're looking into. And maybe we can help you too." Jane wasn't sure how much they would be able to do, but Vex was really intuitive, so maybe if he saw Alex he would know... something? Maybe. It never hurt to try.
"Yeah, yeah of course I would. Thank you." Alex briefly considered the possibility it was a trap set up by AIR themselves then mentally shrugged it away. He'd never get anywhere with that kind of paranoia. He had been idly playing with the computer mouse as they spoke but now he accidentally bumped the scroll wheel. He felt it and scrolled down again to the wall of text but not before the page's headline - How To Dream With Someone Else - had flashed across the screen. He pressed on, hoping she wouldn't notice. It was one thing to talk about mad scientists and probably even powered humans weren't too far but there was something childish about trying to make yourself one with a how-to guide. "Uh, yeah, just set up a time. Somewhere public…ish though. I mean, we can't all meet at the coffee shop but safety in visibility, I guess…"
Jane didn't blame him for being paranoid, especially about her. She would be paranoid too, in his position. Some part of her was a little distrustful about everyone, even Neil. But so far things were going okay, if a bit slow. Her gaze had shifted casually to the computer screen and she arched a brow at what he was reading. "I don't know how public they're going to want to meet. Visibility isn't exactly safe for us if they're watching us, you know what I mean? Are you researching dream walking?"
"What? No." Alex's cheeks grew warm and he glanced at the computer to be sure he'd hidden the title again. He quickly closed that tab and let the one behind it stay up. It was about MK Ultra which was probably equally suspicious but it wasn't as personal as dream walking and wasn't as childish as trying to figure out a way to do it. He wasn't ready to tell Jane about his mother's abilities but he wasn't sure why so he pressed on. "Does it make that much of a difference then? If they're watching you, they already know you're catching up. At least at a bar or wherever, they're not going to have bugs setup to eavesdrop." He thought of Neil and wondered if there wasn't something sensible in his paranoia. "I heard a rumour somebody broke into Neil's apartment a few months ago. Did that happen to you too?"
"We don't know that they're bugging us," Jane pointed out. "And we would rather not be overheard by other people. If you feel more comfortable being out in public somewhere, we can figure it out." She glanced at the computer again, answering his other question a bit absently. "They broke into my room at the inn, but I've moved since then. They probably know where but no one has tried to bust into the apartment, unless they've gotten better at hiding it. I think they made it obvious to us the first time to let us know they were watching." She paused and quirked a grin as her eyes found Alex again. "I probably sound as paranoid as Neil. What do you know about dreamwalking?"
Alex realised Jane had a point; Nobody could know what the bad guys had done or why but they were definitely there. They knew that much at least. "I guess you're right," he conceded. "But just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not after you. I think at this point, pretending anything less is dangerous." Not that Alex was a target yet, probably. He'd had no signs they knew about him and he'd been watching for any since Thanksgiving but he wasn't going to take any chances assuming they weren't.
Alex was surprised by her next question. Well, no. Not quite. He was surprised by how readily she asked as if it wasn't any different from talking about the weather. He wondered what she'd seen while she was in the facility or what her powers were or was she pulling his leg? They had exchanged a few jokes over the last few months during their limited conversations and her tone wasn't always easy to read. "I know I can't do it," he finally said. "Sorry to disappoint but I'm not the man of your dreams."
Jane snorted at the joke. "That's a shame. But this town has lowered my expectations significantly, so I think I'll find a way to move on." She sat back in her chair and folded her arms, studying him intently now. "Do you know anyone who can? There's got to be a reason why you're looking into it. Is there something about dreamwalking that grabbed your interest?" She doubted her knew she could do it, considering how little he knew about her before this conversation. But if there was another dreamwalker in town, she wanted to know who it was.
Alex wasn't sure how much he wanted to tell Jane about his mom. He'd already told her so much and she’d taken a risk revealing a lot about herself too but somehow kidnapping felt more believable than dreamwalking. Mike had accepted his story until that point too. Something told him Jane would believe him if he did tell her but it felt like too much, too fast. He needed time to process everything else first. “Not anymore,” he finally said. He decided he would tell her next time but right then, he didn't think he could handle it. Instead, he started to gather up his things and dropped them roughly into the backpack at his feet. "I've got to go but you know where to find me if you need me. You should talk to your friends and set up a time, let me know when and I'll be there."
She had scared him off. Jane wasn't terribly surprised by it. They didn't know each other too well, and if he knew someone who could dreamwalk, he probably wanted to protect them. Jane supposed she could tell him exactly what she could do, but blurting that out in a library wasn't a very smart idea. Maybe she would just pop into his dreams and show him instead. Jane scooted her own chair back to stand and get out of his way. "I'll talk to them," Jane said, watching as Alex gathered up his things. "And we'll talk soon." Either over the phone, or in his dreams, though the dreams sounded much more appealing to Jane. Like Neil, Alex might not like it, but at least he would be able to see she was for real. "Stay safe at least."