style="font-size:15px;"> Scott stopped and looked at Angel. He walked slowly back over to her, and Angel took the opportunity to get off the table and crouched into a hand-to-hand combat defensive stance. Scott kept coming, and Angel held her knife at the ready, unsure of what this man was going to do. He was out of his mind. Something was wrong with his brain; he couldn’t be trusted. There were no answers for her there.
“Why did you say you were here again?” he asked, stopping short of where she was positioned.
“My friend—” But she was cut off.
“Hessians don’t have friends. You’re defective.”
“What are you talking about?” Now it was Angel’s turn to panic. This man knew far too much. Something was very wrong here. “My turn to ask questions, who are you?”
“I am a Guardian.” Scott deadpanned as he stopped three paces in front of her. Ice flooded Angel’s system as she began to breathe heavier and deeper. It hadn’t occurred to her that this might not have been a trap for Kelly at all but for her instead. Time seemed to slow down around her as her mind went into overdrive for an escape plan. She could feel the adrenaline about to hit her system and empower her to get away. She almost missed his next words.
“Or at least I used to be until they threw me out.”
“You’re a Rouge,” Angel muttered, dropping her guard. This man was a former Hessian who had left, abandoned the practice, and was on the run. That would, at the very least, explain why his mind seemed broken. It was a trait of Rouges these days.
If Scott had heard her, he appeared not to care. Scott seemed to look around the room for something before he continued. He reached for a wristwatch on the table behind Angel, muttering an “Ah, there it is” before looking at it.
“Good,” he commented, placing it around his wrist, “we have time.”
Scott turned and walked toward a door on the adjacent wall. It was only now that Angel realized this room had three doors—one that she had come in through in front of her, one to her left that was open a crack (and Angel could just make out a set of stairs climbing upward, most likely to Scotts living space above the shop), and one that Scott was opening now. Angel followed him slowly.
“Time for what?” she asked as he opened the door. Scott didn’t respond immediately. Instead, he began to walk down a flight of stairs into what might have been a basement.
Scott’s voice echoed back up to her as he made his way down the stairs. “You have to be back by dawn, do you not? We will need to be quick about it, but we have enough time for me to help reinstate some blocks before you go. It is what you came here for, correct?”
“I have no idea what you are talking about,” Angel commented as she followed him down. The staircase turned halfway down at a landing, and the wall was covered in blue light dancing across its surface, almost like…
“It’s called the memory pool, or at least the original is,” Scott commented as she rounded the corner and descended the last five steps. The basement was taken up for the most part by an in-ground swimming pool. It was relatively shallow, probably only three feet deep, and it couldn’t have been more than six or seven feet across its center. Located in the center of the pool was a metal chair, partially submerged and looked like it was a reclining one. Scott was standing in the water next to the chair, unaffected by the fact that his clothing was getting soaked.
“Why is it called a memory pool?” Angel asked, stopping short of the water in front of the stairs that descended into it.
“You have to enter the pool,” Scott commented, ignoring her question. Angel glared at him and did as she was instructed. He motioned for her to sit in the chair. And given that her body was attempting to float, it was rather difficult to do so, but she tried anyway. When she was seated, Scott strapped her arms and legs to the chair and pushed against the back of the chair above her shoulders to lower it into a reclined position in the water.
Scott’s voice was muffled above her as he spoke, “Just listen to the sound of my voice. Close your eyes. You don’t have to focus on the words, just the sound it makes.” Angel’s eyes slid closed as she felt his hand rest on her forehead, keeping her ears below water. “This pool works as a submersion tank for a version of hypnotism. It works much better to suppress memories and emotions than the drug they use, less breaking of the brain. Just lie back and listen to the sound of my voice.”
That was the last of what Angel could make out. After that, all she could really hear was the water trickling into her ears. She could feel the vibrations in the water from her breathing, from Scott shifting his stance. She could hear his deep voice above her, and then she felt all her worries drift away, all her problems gone. She was a Hessian Recruit, and that was all she needed to know.
Angel felt Scott’s hand leave her head, and the chair raised from the water. Her blond hair was dripping rivers down her soaked clothing. Scott was smiling at her. And Angel just looked back at him.
“How do you feel?” Scott asked. Then he frowned and quickly stated, “Don’t answer that. Sorry, stupid question.”
Scott unlatched her wrists and ankles, and Angel slowly stood up. Her balance was lost for several seconds as she attempted to regain her bearings.
“The reorientation process can take a minute,” Scott commented, noticing Angel’s disorientation and unease. “I should warn you, the barriers won’t hold. Something about you is different. I can’t close everything down and lock it away like the others…almost like him.”
Angel cast a glance at Scott. “Him?” she asked.
Scott looked down at his feet and, in the process, looked at his watch. His eyes widened in shock, and he turned and began to run up the stairs. “You’re low on time,” he called back. Angel was confused for a second. Why was he afraid? And then she remembered the Hessians. She was away from the academy, and she hadn’t even found Kelly yet. Angel ran up the stairs after him.
When she reached the top of the stairs, Scott was pulling a coat on over his soaked clothing. He cast a glance at her and spoke, “We don’t have a lot of time. I can drive you to forest road, but from there, you’re on your own.” Scott approached the last door in the backroom, and Angel realized she had missed yet another thing in this room. The door didn’t immediately open to a staircase. Like the one to the basement, it had a door built into the wall as soon as you stepped into the short hall. The store had a back door.
Angel followed Scott out to a back street and over to an old gray car parked right outside the door. “If you visit again,” Scott commented, unlocking the door for her and then walking around to the driver’s side, “use this back door. It’s a lot safer than coming through the front.”
Angel nodded and slid into her seat. The car started with a loud rumble from the muffler. The tailpipe might have been disconnected or something because cars were never in good condition if they were this loud. The ride was silent though over the roar of the car, and Scott came to a stop near the path that Angel had come down on.
“How…?” Angel began, but Scott cut her off.
“All in good time, and time is not something you have right now. Come see me again when these walls start to break,” Scott commented, tapping on her forehead as he did so. Angel frowned and got out of the car. She was about to walk away from the closed door when he stopped her. “I almost forgot. This is yours.”
