Voice (4 page)

“Are you still with me, April?”

“Yes. So are you two together or something?”

“Something like that.” Jemma’s head was pounding. She didn’t think it had worked, transferring the connection, at least not entirely. She could feel her connection with April a little better, though, than she had before.

“Give me a little more detail than that. I mean, look, for all I know, you’re either a trick from the scientists or I’ve gone off the deep end, and either way, I might as well get some girl talk out of it.”

“Well, we haven’t really talked about it.” Jemma rested her head in her good hand.

“Commitment issues?” April sounded understanding.

“More like timing, I think.”

“All right, Jemma,” typed Dr. Harris. Jemma didn’t bother lifting her head, not sure whether she could, but she did let go of her connection with April. “We’ll give you a few hours off while we study these results. Good job this morning.”

Judging by the pounding in her skull, she could use more than a few hours off, but at least they weren’t pushing her until she passed out.

CHAPTER FOUR:

Unraveling

Her head still hurt too much to function by the time her break was over. Dr. Harris seemed willing to believe her, for some reason, and delayed further testing until the next day. She didn’t risk Talking to Jack more while she waited for the drug to wear off, but they did stay in contact, holding on to their connection and the comfort and protection it offered.

By morning, when she got to the lab where Josh and Dr. Harris were waiting, her brain felt almost bruised from the constant pain. Dr. Harris, who seemed reluctant to leave her alone with Josh, looked at her and immediately started typing on his clipboard, something inaudible to Jemma, while gesturing for her to wait near the guard rather than sit. After a few minutes, they left Josh behind, and Jemma, Dr. Harris, and the guard made their way back to the lower level of the facility.

Again, her attempt at looking around once they were in the below-ground lab’s corridor was met with force, and Jemma followed Dr. Harris into one of the small rooms off the hallway, swallowing when she saw the straps on the machine.

“If you can promise not to do anything you shouldn’t, and if you stay still until we tell you otherwise, we won’t strap you down this time,” Dr. Harris typed, watching for Jemma’s nod before he continued. “You will still need the cage for your head, though.”

Jemma nodded again. This would be better, at least, than the last time she was in the machine.

And it was. This time, she wasn’t shaky afterward, wasn’t nauseated while she waited for the results alone in the lab.

She hadn’t checked the time when they’d gotten back to the room, the guard taking up his post outside the door, but she thought maybe half an hour passed before Dr. Harris and Josh finally joined her. Josh carried a tray with instruments and needles.

At least if they were testing her, that probably meant the scans didn’t show she was about to die.

“There’s been some increase in damage,” typed Dr. Harris after he sat, “enough to cause some discomfort, but not enough to cause permanent problems. We can safely continue with our tests.”

As if she weren’t going to be permanently damaged in any way by the captivity or the pain. She nodded the acknowledgment he seemed to be waiting for, and he typed again.

“We’ll continue as we were yesterday, starting with you speaking to April.” Josh came forward to give her the drug, and Jemma closed her eyes, feeling her head expand instantly. At least if Josh was good at one thing, he was good at making the injections themselves painless. “She’ll be receiving instruction, also, but she hasn’t had the same level of experience, so we’re counting on you, Jemma. We need you to find a way to bring that connection in. You increased it yesterday, but not enough, and having the three of you seems to have tired you out too quickly. So we’re starting with just the two of you again, since that’s one of our goals.”

Jemma nodded, glad he was at least being himself in watching his clipboard while he typed. She should be happy he was being kinder to her at times, rather than just ignoring her or treating her like equipment. He wasn’t quite giving her freedoms, not doing anything to risk her escape, but he’d quickly stopped doing anything to actively punish her, and he seemed to be trying to protect her from Josh. However, despite the relief of having someone even nominally on her side, it was easier when he behaved how she expected rather than adding yet another unknown to her life.

“Communication can be whatever topic you’d like,” Dr. Harris typed, turning his attention to the monitor, “as long as you focus on trying to build up that connection as close as you can to what you and Jack have.”

She felt a final push as the drug kicked in fully. She first checked for April’s connection, seeing whether it was present as Jack’s would be. She felt the link like she had Ken’s before the other woman’s capture; it was there once she sought it out, something she could access, like a number she could dial on a phone. It wasn’t really already in her mind. Curious, she sought out the connections for the others, for Jack, for Marcia and Ken.

They were there, but they remained disconnected.

Each one had a sort of flavor, the hint of personality that belonged to its owner, and a hint of color. Marcia was a scarlet red. Kendall was teal. Jack’s was a warm brown.

April’s was a dark purple. Rather than try to contact her directly, Jemma tried to see whether she could pull the connection closer to her, pull it in closer to where her connection with Jack lived when it was active. She tugged on the purple string, but it resisted, remaining taut, almost angry.

“April?”

“What are you
doing
? It feels like someone’s… I don’t know, shoving a poker through my skull.”

All right. That wasn’t something they’d likely be trying again, then.

“Sorry about that. I was seeing whether I could get a better connection going.”

“Well, stop it.”

“Already stopped.” Jemma hesitated. “Do you feel pain from the tests normally?”

“Some. It’s worse when I actually try, so, you know, I usually don’t. Doesn’t really seem to matter whether I’m actively Talking to you or not, though, when they inject me with this shit.” She sent the equivalent of a wince. “Still hurts either way, and it hurts more the longer it takes the drug to wear off.”

“It does.” She took a breath. “All right, they really want us to work on this connection. It’s a little stronger today than it was at first. Can you feel it? What’s in the background, not the words, but my presence, almost.”

“I think so. I mean, if it’s getting stronger, maybe we should just keep Talking, right?”

It wasn’t a horrible suggestion. Familiarity did seem to play a role, and it would give Jemma a chance to think about other things she might try.

“That seems fine for now.”

“Okay, so, you and Jack. You said it was bad timing. Do you mean with the mad scientists and the captivity and whatnot? Cause how I see it, that’s kind of the best time to have a special someone, isn’t it?”

Jemma never really had been big on the “girl talk” thing. When she had made friends, they were typically other people like her, into books, science fiction, school. A theoretical discussion on time travel was more frequent than the occasional relationship discussion. Those, when Jemma did feel the need to talk, she usually saved for her sister. What would she say to Jilly?

“We didn’t know each other, really, until after we started Talking. We got to know each other that way first.”

“I mean, that’s kinda like meeting online, right? That’s not too weird.”

Jemma smiled. “I guess not. Anyway,” she said, shifting the subject to something potentially more comfortable, “what do you like to do in your free time? When you have options, I mean.”

“You mean before I got stuck in this hell hole?” she asked, bitterness lacing her tone. “Basketball, mostly.” April sounded somehow both excited and resigned. “Practice takes up a lot of time, but it’s worth it. Then there’s school and all, and any free time leftover I pretty much just hang out with a few of my teammates. What about you?”

Jemma opened her eyes and looked at Dr. Harris, who nodded at the monitor and then gestured for her to continue. She did, closing her eyes again first. “Books. I work in a library, normally, and I love reading. I watch TV shows sometimes, but usually I stick to reading.”

“That sounds lonely to me.” April didn’t add anything for several seconds, and Jemma remembered realizing how much worse this whole situation would be for someone social like Jilly. “It sounded like you had Jack though, right?” she continued finally. “How’d you get split up, anyway?”

She thought for a moment before responding. “We escaped the place we were being held. We met up with someone who was able to figure out what I told you yesterday about the Event and why they were studying us, and we figured our chances were better if we split up.” She didn’t want to spell out all the chances they were hoping to improve on, not with Josh having hinted at trying to get the machines to read the actual words, but she sent along her regret at the choice.

“That was a shitty decision.”

“Yeah.” She used her thumbnail to pick at her index finger, still unable to rub her arm without some pain. “I can’t undo it now, though. I don’t think they’d let me Talk to him if we were in the same facility, either, not after we escaped.”

“How’d you manage to do that, anyway?”

“Distractions, luck, and help.”

Silence again, for a moment. “My parents were always pretty protective, so I didn’t get into the whole dating thing until I got to college. I’ve been keeping it pretty casual to make up for it. I miss my teammates and my family.”

Jemma felt Jack’s connection kick in, and she sent April a surge of sympathy before sending Jack a hello.

“Good morning, Jemma. Fantastic accommodations, hmm? Did you enjoy your four-star breakfast this morning?”

She chuckled. “Only four stars?”

“Well, I wouldn’t want to oversell the place.”

Jemma’s eyes flew open at the sound of the clipboard’s speaker. “Now that you’re communicating with both of them again, I’d like you to bring them together as you did yesterday. This time, though, before you try to apply the connection to your conversation with April, Joshua is going to inject you with another drug. This one should enhance things even further. You’ll be the only one receiving this injection.”

She pulled the two into the group conversation again. “They’re going to inject me with something else to make it easier for me to make the connection with April stronger.”

“After how bad you felt yesterday?” Jack’s tone had gone neutral, and Jemma bit her lip.

“It’s not like I can stop them. My head’s already in constant pain. It’s hard to think about anything more complicated than—”

“Girl talk,” supplied April.

“Right, girl talk,” Jemma continued. “They gave me another scan this morning before deciding to do this, so I guess they think it’s worth the risk.”

“Wait, they’ve messed you up enough that they’re scanning your brain? And you went back?”

Jemma ignored April, ignored the prick in her arm and the burning sensation of the new drug, and addressed Jack instead. “Can you see whether you can see something? It’s not something I noticed before, so I think it’s the drug, but I can see colors for the different connections. Not that it’s necessarily relevant, but it would help to know whether it’s real or I’m just exhausted and imagining things.”

“I’ll check,” he sent, tone still void of emotion.

“Oh, and don’t touch, at least not yet. April said it hurt.”

“Is
that
what you were doing?”

“There are colors, but they’re pretty faint. April is some sort of purple, dark. You’re almost gold, maybe a little more brown.”

“You two match almost,” April added. “You’re not the same color, but close. That’s cool.”

Marcia and Ken, though, were very different colors. It could make sense for similar colors to be able to Talk more easily, but Marcia and Ken didn’t seem to have any trouble communicating, so that might not be the case.

Any further exploration of that thought was interrupted by the second drug taking full and sudden effect. Jemma opened her eyes, seeing the room almost glow, the light too bright to handle. Her head felt ready to split open, but she couldn’t make a sound, couldn’t even focus on sending a response to Jack, who was asking whether she was okay.

Her brain was crawling, covered in bugs with needles for legs.

On top of the sensations, in addition to the pain, the light, to Jack and April trying to Talk to her, she was suddenly aware of something new.

Though she knew Talking was, on some level, visual as much as audio, it felt like she was hearing it when people Talked to her. This, though it still translated to words, was more visual. She couldn’t quite see the words themselves, but she could feel them, knew what they were, her mind translating emotion and image to something that made sense.