Purgatech: Jess' Horror

Chapter Twelve

Dylan felt like the confines of the tech room were closing in on him. He paced behind the techs who were observing the feed from the house.

Noah tilted his head up, looking at Dylan over his shoulder. "You're going to wear that piece of carpet out, man."

"Can you blame me? Did you see what happened up there?"

"Yeah I did. This is all fantastic. We got some great stuff here."

"Are you kidding me? We shouldn't be out here watching after what we’ve seen. We should be in there, attending to our recruits."

"You know we can't do that," Lisa said, coming over toward Dylan. "You know what Marshall says."

"I don't give a crap what Marshall says! After everything that happened with the last group, you expect me just to stand here while some girl's up there lifeless on the floor? We’re responsible for those people in there. Don’t you get that?"

"She's not lifeless anymore!" Noah said. “Watch this!”

Dylan lunged forward, clamping don on to the back of Noah’s chair with both hands.

Noah shook his head, laughing as he clicked the mouse and brought up a separate window on one of the screens. "I’m rewinding it. You have to see this to believe it!"

Dylan could barely tear his it would eyes away from the screen. Jess sat slumped over on the attic floor sobbing into her hands. But when he heard Lisa gasp beside him, his gaze darted to the other screen.

The feed was from a light fixture overhead in the stairwell of the attic. It gave a bird’s-eye view of where Erica had fallen. She lay there motionless as Jess came barreling down the stairs. But when Jess landed beside her, Erica seemed to come back around. First there was a twitch in her legs, and then her head started to move.

"So she's okay?" Dylan asked.

"Just wait. Watch what happens."

Erica's head snapped to the side so violently that Dylan cringed. Her eyes were as wide as saucers, so much so that Jess had started to recoil from her, trying to claw her way back up the stairs. But when Erica opened her mouth to speak, Jess froze. Dylan didn’t blame her. The ungodly sound of the voice coming from Erica’s mouth made Dylan’s skin prickle.

“You'll be stuck here like me. Forever. You can't get out. You're going to be stuck here like me forever.”

“What did she say?!”

Noah rewound the recording and played it again. Lisa gasped behind him when she heard it.

"Jesus!" Dylan said running his fingers through his hair.

Dylan couldn’t do anything but watch helplessly as she tried to get away from her friend. But she didn’t seem to be able to muster the strength to go anywhere. She simply sat in the stairwell, shaking from head to toe.

Noah whooped and clapped his hands together before leaning forward and replaying the recording over again. Dylan stood there watching it dumbfounded, glancing at Lisa beside him, who looked just as confused as he was. Her eyes were wide and her mouth hung open, mirroring Dylan’s bewilderment.

There was no way to explain it. Maybe by watching it over and over again it would somehow make sense. Surely it was some kind of trick or enhancement that Noah had done with his computer expertise. But there was no way he would fake it, not after everything they’d put into this venture. No way he would risk Marshall finding out he’d falsified evidence, not when so much was at stake.

And Jess? There was no way she and Erica were putting on a show. This was real. You can’t fake terror like that.

“Play it again. Slowly this time,” he directed to Noah.

Jess’ voice was frantic right from the start. When she came into view from the attic, bounding down the stairs, she was on a mission, but something stopped her. She came to a skidding stop the moment she saw Erica. When Erica lifted her head ever so slowly, her head snapping to the left, it was in such a way that no human could possibly do without screaming out in utter pain.

Dylan knew Jess. She would suffer anything to help Erica. But the way she recoiled from her immediately, leaning back onto the steps and clinging to them with her fingernails, anything to get away from the person she saw in front of her…something was terribly wrong up there in that attic. Dylan swore he could hear the sound of her nails digging into the hardwood as she tried to get away from her friend. "

“You'll be stuck here like me. Forever. You can't get out. You're going to be stuck here like me forever.”

Dylan shivered. The voice that came from her mouth was deep and guttural, demonic.

"Well, if that isn’t evidence, than I don't know what is,” Noah said.

"That's evidence of nothing."

Noah spun his chair to face him. "What do you mean?"

“I mean, the girl’s obviously injured. She is not in her right mind. She's hurt and she’s talking gibberish."

"Are you kidding me? This is the best evidence we've had so far. Better than any of those EVP's we got from the previous trial users. Man, when Marshall sees this, he’s going to flip. He's going to give us all bonus."

"No," Dylan snapped. "You're not showing this to Marshall."

Noah did a double-take. "What the hell are you talking about? This is exactly what we’re working for. This is why I've given up my life, why we’ve all given up our lives for the last six months! The last three years! To build this tech, to set up these trials. This is the evidence we needed and there's no way in hell I'm going to keep this a secret."

A wave of adrenaline spiked Dylan’s temper. He leaned forward and grabbed Noah by the collar with both hands. He clenched his fingers together and pulled Noah towards him.

“I'm running things around here, Noah and what I say goes. You show this to Marshall and I'll personally running out of here. Got that?"

Noah’s face went bright red and he blinked quickly. “Y-yes. I g-got it.”

Dylan shoved Noah away from him, and then turned and stormed toward the door. He punched at it with his fist, sending the door flying open. It took every last bit of cool he had left to make it to his office down the hall. When he got inside, he slammed the door behind him and locked it from the inside.

He immediately started pacing the length of the room.

“What the hell? What’s going on? In that house? With me? What?!”

He clenched his hands at either side. It was the only thing he could do to quell the urge to punch something, or someone.

All of these people, all they cared about was getting these products to market, making money. Noah? All he cared about was how good he was going to look to Marshall for capturing that footage from inside the house. They didn't care about what is happening to those people on the inside. To Erica, to Jess.

Dylan had as much invested in the project as they did, probably more so. He hadn't taken the ‘normal’ career path after graduating from university. He could've easily moved to the city. He could be making easy bucks working on Wall Street or in some tech company with a lot more capital than Purgatech. But he had taken a chance on working with Marshall. When Marshall came to him with what he wanted to do with Dylan's expertise, Dylan was as skeptical as the next person. But Marshall had made a compelling case for it from the start.

It wasn't as if Dylan didn't believe in what Marshall did. He’d had experiences in his life, and it was those experiences he shared with Jess that convinced him that this was what he should do with his life's work. But now that they were in the thick of things and making it all their hard work was coming to fruition, Dylan couldn't help but doubt if what they were doing was worth it.

He went around his desk and sunk into his office chair, leaning back and drumming his fingers on the desktop. If it was up to him, he would have shut this thing down months ago. Sure, there was something to be said for pushing through any stumbling blocks and moving forward, but people's lives were at stake here. He wasn't exactly sure how Marshall had worked things out but there certainly wasn't anyone around asking questions about the trial users.

“Augh!”

Dylan pushed his chair away from the desk and jumped up. He needed some fresh air. It used to be his favorite thing to do when he was trying to work out a kink in any of the software o a glitch with one of the gadgets. Now, he was only doing it to keep himself sane.

By the time he got outside and sucked in a few breaths of cold, fall air, he felt the tension easing a little. But when he looked back up at the Ridgely Estate, he wasn’t sure the fresh air was going to do him any good. Maybe a few laps around the outbuildings would help.

So he set off, picking up his pace, enjoying the sound of fallen leaves crunching under the soles of his shoes. The sky was cloudless and the stars were out in full effect tonight. He glanced up as he walked, watching the vapor of his breath escape up into the inky blackness of night. This was all he needed. This would clear his head, let the tension roll off of him so he could lead his team clearly and get Jess and the rest of the Gamma Team out of there safely.

As he was coming back toward the out building, he could hear a voice through one of the open windows. He stopped tilted his head to one side. It was Marshall.

"We’re not going to have to worry about that. I took care of the authorities.” He paused for a moment. “Let’s just say I greased a few palms. There won't be anyone coming around asking questions anymore. Besides, the way we set up our screening process, we made sure to only pick people who didn't have anyone who would come asking questions about them if they didn't show up."

Dylan did a double-take. So, all that time he had spent scouting out the perfect recruits was all for nothing? Marshall had fixed this thing from the star? Dylan moved closer to the window.

“We’re in the final test phase now. We’ve got one last user group who are trying our latest tech and then I'd say we go to market in about a month.”

Marshall let out a smarmy laugh that made any sense of relaxation Dylan had achieved instantly vanish.

"You can let the board of advisers know that once we hit the marketplace, we’re going to make a butt load of money. Those bonuses are going to start rolling in within weeks of our products being out there."

Dylan walked in a circle and then spun back the other way again All this work and he was only in it for the money? Dylan had done all of this, used his expertise as a way to help people, not just to bilk money out of them. Jess’ boyfriend was right. Marshall was just like any other corporate goon. All he cared about was $'s and how much when into his bank account. Well, Dylan wasn't like that. And he sure as hell wasn't going to let those people inside suffer any longer for Marshall’s ambition.

Dylan strode up the gravel drive and headed inside. Lisa came out of the tech room when she saw him.

"Dylan, there something you need to –"

Dylan had up his hand to stop her. "Not right now, Lisa." He continued down the hall but she called after him.

“Dylan, this is important.”

Dylan paused for a moment and spun around to face her. "Lisa, what is your job description?"

"I'm your assistant."

"Exactly. Now, do your damn job and take care of it. Or I’ll fire you and find someone else who will."

Dylan didn't wait for his response. He continued up the hall and when he got to Marshal’s office, he kicked open the door and burst inside.

Marshall was sitting with his patent leather shoes propped up on the desk, but he instantly bolted upright.

"What the hell are you doing, Nixon?"

"What I'm doing is trying to save those people inside!" Dylan said, pointing in the direction of the house of the main house.

"Save them? Save them from what?"

"From whatever's in there! And more importantly, from you!"

Marshall stood behind his desk, defiant. He leaned forward with his fingers propping him up and looked Dylan straight in the eye. "I don't know what the hell's gotten into you, Nixon, but if you don't watch yourself –"

"What? You going to fire me? Throw me off the property? I've heard all that before and you know what? I don't give a crap!"

"You will give a crap when I do exactly that and strip your name off of every document and piece of technology we been working on."

Dylan cheeks flushed red hot.

"That shut you up didn't it?" Marshall stood upright and came around the desk slowly. "I told you all along but if I didn't like how you were running things that I would make changes. Maybe now is the right time to do that."

Dylan shook his head at him which only made the vein in Marshal’s temple throb.

“You won't do that. You can't afford to get rid of me, not now, not when we’re just about to the achieve everything you've set out to."

“Oh yeah? Watch me."

Marshall reached for the phone on his desk and had lifted the receiver but Dylan stopped him. He leaned forward and yanked the phone away from him and slammed it down on the desk. Dylan could feel the feel the rage building inside him. He couldn't explain it, he was always one to keep his emotions in check but maybe it was seeing what happened to Jess and Erica on the feed had affected him more than he thought it would.

There something about watching those feeds that was getting to him. It wasn't just what happened or what those people were going through. It was some sort of strange vibe that seemed to emanate from the footage he watched. Every time he did, he seemed to feel a sense of foreboding. It was almost as if all the negativity and sadness were coming at him through the screen and he was ingesting and like some sort of pathogen that his body couldn't handle.

"You do that and I'll go straight to the Board of Directors."

Marshall tilted his head back and laughed. "Oh really? If you can manage to get one of them to take your call, you really think anyone of them are going to take your call? You're a techie, a computer troll. All you do is monitor things. You're a glorified nightwatchman.

"I may not know how to run the systems around here but I sure as hell know how to lock them down. If you test me I can shut everything down and somehow keep any of this tech from seen the light of day."

Dylan turned and stormed away from him. He had to. There was so much more he wanted to say, but what scared him the most were the things he wanted to do to him.

And yet he knew Marshall was the least of his problems.

There were four people inside that house that needed him to keep his head on straight. He wasn’t going to let them down. He would deal with Marshall later.