Home > Harvester of Bones (SPECTR Series 3 #4)(9)

Harvester of Bones (SPECTR Series 3 #4)(9)
Author: Jordan L. Hawk

“Yes, yes.” Walsh waved his hand impatiently. “But there are obvious drawbacks. The possessed becomes increasingly more unstable with time. Hence our experiments: to determine if a drug, or combination of drugs, could handicap the NHE’s mental influence, while still reaping the benefits of its power.”

Goddess. “So you used children?”

“I believe it’s my turn to ask a question,” Walsh replied calmly. As though he hadn’t just said something monstrous. “Would you say your paranormal abilities are noticeably stronger than those of your peers? Do you tire less easily, for example?”

His powers were vastly stronger, if he’d been boosted by Gray. But that wasn’t what Walsh was asking. “You want to know if there were any permanent effects.”

“Of course. Your answer, please.”

“I’m good,” John said, thinking back to his time in the Academy. “I placed high on all of my tests, yes. But I wasn’t some off-the-charts phenomenon, either.”

“Hmm.” Walsh’s brow furrowed as he made his notes.

John’s turn again. “Why didn’t you ask for adult volunteers for your study? Why use children?”

Walsh chuckled. “If you work for SPECTR, you’re well aware summoning NHEs is extremely illegal. There are no exceptions for research. We could hardly ask for volunteers, or go through any sort of official channels. We did consider using prisoners, but in the end, acquiring children was simply easier.”

Easier. The word sickened John. “So you pretended to be a group meant to ‘cure’ kids with paranormal abilities.”

“Exactly.” A faint smile flickered over Walsh’s mouth, as though John were a student who’d given the correct answer on a quiz. “It wasn’t difficult, given the anti-paranormal sentiment in evangelical circles,. And of course, lawmakers are very hesitant to put any sort of restraints on ‘faith-based’ initiatives, for fear of losing conservative donors. The facade not only allowed us to operate without any pesky oversight from the local government, but to have a supply of paranormally abled children delivered right to our door by parents who didn’t want to think too closely about what would happen to those children after they drove away.”

One evil lending cover for another, and kids suffering because of it. “And none of them ever asked questions?”

“We were very clear our methods meant keeping our charges isolated from the evils of the outside world.” Walsh shrugged. “Subjects who either had no ability or were otherwise unsuitable for the study were kept in the upstairs quarters and eventually returned to their families.”

John shook his head slowly. Walsh looked so calm. Spoke of these things as though they were harmless. As though no one had been hurt.

He gestured to the picture on the desk. “What if it had been your grandchildren down there in that basement? You’d feel different about it then, wouldn’t you?”

Walsh sighed, as if disappointed. “I’ll give this one to you for free, Nineteen. Sometimes one must make sacrifices for the greater good. My grandchildren are loved. Cherished. Their mother would never hand them over to strangers without oversight. They would have been terrible candidates for any of my research, even if they had paranormal ability.” He paused, then added, “You must understand. The work needed to be done, and subjects had to be obtained. I am not a cruel man. I hold no personal animosity toward you.”

The sheer gall stole John’s breath away. It was only through years of his training as an agent that he was able to keep from screaming his rage at Walsh.

Walsh remained unperturbed. “It seems as though some of your memories have returned. Was this a recent development, and if so, what triggered it?”

John ran one hand over his face. This was a fucking nightmare, but he had to keep going. He had to get the answers this man held. “A case I was working on brought me back into contact with the people I thought were my parents. Things didn’t add up. Then a telepathic rougarou told me I’d die without even knowing my own name. After that, I started digging…and flashes of memory came back. I visited the Center and figured out what happened there, or some of it. But there are still too many holes.” He dropped his hand. “There was a naga down there.”

“A telepath?” Walsh sounded impressed. “Very interesting! I wonder if contact with it had anything to do with your recovery, or partial recovery, as it seems.” His pencil flew over the notepad.

John swallowed thickly. “The naga. Who was she? What happened to shut down the facility, and why was she left there?”

“That’s more than one question.”

“Fine. Who was the naga?”

“Subject 10-05-12. A talented cryokinetic.” Walsh tapped his pencil against his teeth for a moment. “Since recovering some memories, have you found any of your preferences have changed? Do you no longer like certain foods, for example?”

The question made John nervous. It implied the possibility that the self he’d been all these years wasn’t real, might be replaced by a stranger. “No. Nothing’s different. Why was the facility abandoned?”

“I don’t know the entire story,” Walsh said. “The only people who knew that were…well, you and the other subjects. It was late at night, during shift change, which must have been part of the plan. You’d all been behaving unusually well—a ruse, in retrospect—and had earned the privilege of having your doors unlocked. That was not my decision,” he added, as though worried John might sneer at his mistake. “Dr. Stanley was in charge of your schedules. He paid for it with his life.”

Walsh tutted softly, disapproving of the late Dr. Stanley. “From what I understand, the first indication something had gone wrong came when an orderly found four of you unconscious in the hall near the stairway. None of you were responsive, and while they were debating what to do with you, the screaming began. The naga had been hiding until she could bite Dr. Stanley. He died very quickly, which caused the staff to panic. They fled, taking you four with them. I understand she managed to kill two more orderlies and one lab technician before being sealed in. She was…a remarkable subject.”

And she’d thought John was coming back to save her. Sekhmet have mercy. “That doesn’t explain the shut down.”

“I’m getting there,” Walsh said impatiently. “It didn’t take long to realize that three of you had been imprinted with Subject 15-06-5’s memories, up to the point of the suicide attempt that necessitated you all be moved downstairs on a permanent basis, where you could be more closely monitored. All memories of the downstairs facility before that, or anything after the suicide attempt, were gone.”

John’s head spun. “But how did that happen?”

“One question at a time,” Walsh said, a waspish edge to his tone now. “The deaths and your bizarre impairment made the people holding the purse strings nervous. I wanted to continue—the memory alterations alone would have made a fascinating study—but was overruled. A cover story was issued to the press, and the four of you were quietly dispersed to various state schools for the paranormally abled. Operation Mephisto was shut down and all files sealed or destroyed.”

Hot Books
» House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1)
» A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire
» From Blood and Ash (Blood And Ash #1)
» A Million Kisses in Your Lifetime
» Deviant King (Royal Elite #1)
» Den of Vipers
» House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2)
» The Queen of Nothing (The Folk of the Air #
» Sweet Temptation
» The Sweetest Oblivion (Made #1)
» Chasing Cassandra (The Ravenels #6)
» Wreck & Ruin
» Steel Princess (Royal Elite #2)
» Twisted Hate (Twisted #3)
» The Play (Briar U Book 3)