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“What do you mean?” Jasper asks.
“Well, I knew that pulling off a stunt like that would obviously end with some kind of repercussions, but I had to do it in order to plant enough curiosity in your mind that you would come back of your own accord.”
“How did you know-”
“Curiosity is a powerful thing, my dear boy. Curiosity is the spark for madness, and once one falls down the rabbit hole of curiosity, there is little that anyone can do to save them.” Her eyes are still shining, and I swear that if they burnt any brighter, she would be searing holes right through Jasper since she hasn’t taken her eyes off him since we got here. As if sensing my unease, Annabelle breaks her eyes away from him to look at me, “Sit down, would you? It’s unsettling my nerves to see you so standoffish. I thought I’d be treated with a bit more hospitality from you, considering everything your mother and I had been through.”
I consider running away at the mention of my mum. This woman is clearly off her chops. But she has a point when she said that curiosity is a powerful thing, and so I let myself be seated and feed into my own curiosity at the mention of my mum. “How do you know her?” I ask accusingly.
“She never mentioned me,” Annabelle says, putting a hand dramatically to her heart as if she’s been stabbed, “Oh poor Ophelia, but I guess after everything that happened, it makes sense that she wouldn’t want to tell you about anything. Our family history is quite messy after all.”
“Tell me about what? What happened between the two of you?”
“Full of questions, aren’t you? I’ll answer your questions all in due time, but before I answer anything, I want you to do something for me. Can you do that?”
“What is it?”
“Wise girl, aren’t you? Not signing yourself up for anything that you don’t know. So much like your mother when she was your age.”
“How do you know my mother?” I say again, teeth gritted. I’ve never had much patience, but Annabelle is really testing what little patience I do have.
“Now, now,” she says calmly, “there’s no need to get mad. You see we’ve got all the time in the world. I want to show you something.”
She stands and reluctantly I follow her. Jasper stands to follow in suit, but Annabelle turns back around and shakes her head, “This is girl business only. You wait here and we’ll be back in a minute.”
She leads me to a room full of computers and screens, much like the one that we were in yesterday. But instead of a glass wall showing a simulator, there is a single chair in the middle of the room with wires and hooks attached all over. “Come,” she pats the seat. “Sit.”
I laugh, “Is this a joke?” I ask, still in shock that she expects this of me. How in the world does she actually think that I am going to trust her, after she tries to kill my friends only the day before?
“What reason do I have to kill you?” She asks, and I can’t argue with that. If she wanted me for my supposed knowledge of where the ring is, then she couldn’t kill me, not if she wanted the answers. If she wanted to bargain with Albert for something, she wouldn’t kill me either, since she knows that I’m only of use to him if I’m alive. I walk slowly over to the chair, and as I lay down, she begins to attach the wires to my temples, as well as my arms and legs. “These are just to make sure your vitals remain stable.”
“Remain stable?” I begin to panic. “Why would they not? What are you about to do to me?”
“Just trust me, remember,” she says, stroking my hair back gently. “After all, I am practically your godmother.”
I don’t even have time to register her words before a shock goes through my body and everything goes black.
Chapter 26 - Emerson Clarke
When I regain consciousness, I look around and note that I’m no longer in the white seat that I was in a moment ago. I’m not even inside a building. Instead, I’m standing outside the front of Calveron, with nothing but the blue sky above me and the desolate landscape around me. “Welcome to the Calveron of before you were born.” Annabelle pops up beside me.
“What are we doing here? Where are we? How did we even get here?” There are so many more questions I want to ask, but I can tell by the look on Annabelle’s face that I could ask all the questions in the world, and she would only answer the ones that suited her. By her lack of answers, I don’t think any of my questions suit her.
“This is some new technology we’ve been working on. It takes the viewer back to a place in their memory, so they can relive it.”
“But you said this was before I was born. If this isn’t my memory-” my words falter with the realisation that this isn’t my memory at all, this is Annabelle’s, and her knowing smile only confirms my suspicions.
“I brought you here because I knew it would be harder to convince you of my cause, than my Jasper. You see, he doesn’t know it yet, but his mum and I are very close. Almost like sisters.” She laughs like she made a joke but before I have time to ask her about it, she continues. “I need you to witness something that happened, something that caused the divide between your parents and Jasper’s.”
I hear a door slam and see a young, heavily pregnant woman run through the doors. Tears are streaming down her face so violently; I can only imagine what kind of hell she had just experienced to feel emotion that raw. Her long, blond hair is pulled back into a messy ponytail at the back of her head, and her steely blue eyes are so bloodshot, it is hard to even look at her without feeling at least an ounce of the pain she is feeling. She would have been what I consider extremely beautiful, if not for her looking so broken. I thought that she might stop when she saw us, but she runs right past us as if she can’t even see us. Which I guess makes sense, since she probably can’t.
Instead, she runs straight into the arms of another woman, a woman that looks exactly like me. “Mum?” I whisper, unable to help myself.
“Shh, you’re ruining it.” Annabelle chides. I look at her and realise with a start that even though her hair is thoroughly more bleached, her eyes are significantly less bloodshot, and her demeanour is considerably more confident, the girl that just ran past us is her. I must have been staring at Annabelle, wondering what in the world had been done to her to make her feel like that, when she coughs a small cough and gives a pointed look towards the two girls who are wrapped in a tight embrace.
My mother, the perfect picture of confidence and grace, slowly strokes her hair. I can hear her whispering that it’s going to be alright. “Everything is going to be okay,” she is telling the other woman. I close my eyes, just for a moment, and imagine that she’s saying those words over me instead. We’re back at home, I’m a little girl again, and she’s tucking me into bed, stroking my cheek softly until I fall asleep.
I stay this way, comfortably in my wistful, imaginary happy place, until I hear my mother say calmly, “Why don’t we find somewhere to sit, and you can tell me what happened.” She starts to walk back into Calveron, but the younger Annabelle pulls her back. Her body is trembling so vigorously, I don’t understand how she’s still standing.
