Purgatech: Aaron's Terrible Realization

Chapter 16

I opened my eyes and saw Jada in front of me. She too seemed to have recovered from whatever had just happened to us. Her chest was heaving as she gasped for air.

"Are you okay?" I asked. "Are you hurt? What happened?" I wasn't giving her time to answer my questions but I couldn't stop myself. She was still breathing too hard to answer anyway.

"Was that what I think it was?" I said. Jada just looked at me and nodded. Her breath was coming back slowly. She gasped out words, one at a time, between deep inhalations.

"It... was... they... were... her... memories."

"How do you know?"

"Told... me..." Jada said. She sat abruptly on the floor, her legs simply folding. I tried to catch her but only half managed it. We fell together and she ended up sitting mostly on my lap. I just held her for a few moments. Eventually, her breathing returned to a normal pace.

"She told me," she said, finally. She was repeating her answer to my last question.

"How? You don't have the app."

"Really?" said Jada. She was giving me the, "don't be so stupid" look I was becoming familiar with. "After what just happened, you think we really need an app?"

"I don't know. What exactly did just happen?"

"She showed us what she wanted us to see, I guess." She looked a little lost with that explanation.

"So you saw it too? Everything? The Christmas party, the thing about the cat, the blood from the eye?"

"Mhm," said Jada. "And she was talking to me. I guess you didn't hear that though."

"No, I didn't. What did she say?"

"That she was showing us what we needed to see. Said that it would help us understand."

"Understand what?"

"Many things. But first and most importantly, we need to be careful. Very careful."

"Careful of who?" I asked.

"Who was the asshole in those memories, Aaron?"

"Oh. Slade." Of course. "Is he going to try to do something to us?"

"I don't know. Mary said that she would explain everything."

"Good. I'll see if she's ready to start talking." I pulled out my phone and was unlocking the screen to find the etherchip app when Jada put her hand over mine.

"No, Aaron, she's not going to talk to us through the app."

“Why not?”

"Because of her husband."

"What?"

"I don't know, that's what she said."

We just sat there on the floor in front of the closet for a few minutes, trying to wrap our heads around everything that was happening. Things fired off pretty quick around Purgatech, it seemed.

"Can we download her?" I asked.

"I don't know. We could try asking maybe?"

"Well, if she isn't going to explain herself through the app, I can't really think of another way to communicate."

"Give it a shot, then."

I pulled up the app and sent off a message to Mary, asking permission to download her into our reality. As I waited for a reply, I found myself looking at the door to the closet. Just on the other side, I knew that May's ghost was waiting, glowing red. I couldn't tell if I felt comforted or even more terrified for having seen the way that her marriage had soured and turned her into the monster that the town had believed her to be. My phone buzzed and I looked down to see her answer.

"Yes. Closet."

"What does that mean?" I asked Jada.

"Do I really have to keep saying 'I don't know?'"

"Fair," I said. "Got you glasses ready? She said ‘yes’ so let's give this a shot."

We stood, side by side in front of the door, holding hands. I matched the deep breath that Jada took as I lined up my orb camera on the door. Mary's orb glowed steadily in the deep shadows of the bunkroom. I counted us down.

"Three.... Two.... One.... Go!"

We both punched the hexagonal button and waited for the download to begin.

Nothing happened.

"What the hell?" said Jada. I could tell that she was getting frustrated. She didn't like being so lost for information.

"That's exactly how we did it the other times," I said, completely confused.

I flipped back to the text editor and was about to ask Mary what was going on when I remembered the second part of her text. ‘Closet’. I guess at first I'd just assumed she was making sure we knew where she was. But that didn't make any sense, of course we knew she was in the closet. After all, she was the only ghost in the room.

"Mary, why did you mention the closet?" I typed. Jada looked over my shoulder as we awaited a response.

"Her"

"Me?" Jada said. "Again? Why me?"

"Maybe because you're a woman?"

"Oh really?" She wasn't pleased. "Just because I'm a woman, ghost women would rather talk to me?"

"Well..." I started. Jada cut me off.

"Anna liked me because she thought you were cute and you made her nervous. That's literally got nothing to do with me being a woman. She was just super shy about you. This is different. Honestly, its a little sexist to think that women only want to have anything to do with other women." I was becoming slightly irritated.

"Are you done?" I asked her. She only made a face so I continued. "Obviously, there has been some trauma in Mary's life. Agreed?"

"Yeah."

"And who would you say had the most to do with that trauma?"

"Henry, I guess."

"That's right," I said. "Her husband. A man." I stressed that last word.

"Okay," was all she said.

"Also, who is the one that suggested she be confined, first to her room, and then to this damn closet?" I asked, gesturing at the door in front of us.

"The doctor," Jada said. The tone in her voice was cooling off. I had the impression she knew where I was going with my line or reasoning.

"Yes. The doctor. Another man. Who knows how many more there might have been. She's from a different time, Jada. We could see that, plain as day, from her memories."

"Fine, Aaron. You're right," she said. Her voice was only slightly begrudging.

"What's that?" I said, reaching out to poke her in the side. She giggled.

"I said you're right, I'm sorry. If she wants me, I'll choose to take it as a compliment and move on."

My phone buzzed while she was talking. We both looked down as I pulled up the message.

"In" Jada frowned at me. I didn't understand either.

"In where?" I typed.

"Closet" Just as I read this out loud, there was a loud click from the door. I looked up from the phone to see Jada, wide eyed and staring at me.

"She wants me to go in there?" she asked. Her voice was shaky. I ran a hand through my hair and nodded.

"That's what it seems like. I'm pretty sure she just unlocked the door for you."

"Aaron, I don't want to."

"It's goin to be..."

"I'm scared. Please, I don't want to do this." All of the humor had gone out of the situation. I didn't like the look in her eyes. She was like a small animal caught in the high beams of a semi.

I took both of Jada's hands in mine.

"You can do this," I said. "You're way more brave than me." She opened her mouth to protest. I hurried on.

"You are always the one speaking up when it needs to be done. I've heard you challenge Turner several times and I'm way too shy for that. Plus, you came up with the plan to get the key from Omri. It makes sense for you to be the one to do this. I would help you if I could but I don't think that's why I'm here."

She looked at me for a long time.

"Why are you here, then?" Jada asked. I didn't know what to say. So I opened my mouth and hoped for the best.

"I'm here for you."

"For me? What do you mean?"

Again, I had no idea how to respond. Instead, I leaned forward and kissed her.

I could tell from her little gasp of breath that I caught her off guard. She didn't push me away though. She kissed back.

We separated after a moment and she smiled at the floor, swinging one foot back and forth a little. Then she stood squarely and looked me in the eye.

"Okay," she said. "I'm ready."

Jada walked past me, touching my arm on the way and letting her hand slide off as she made her way to the closet door. Without hesitating, probably to prevent herself from thinking too much, she grabbed the door handle and pulled.

The door creaked open. The inside of the closet was unremarkable. Piles of boxes and clothes lay strewn about. It was a perfectly mundane scene. Still, a chill ran up my spine as I recalled the exact same closetscape that had appeared in my dream.

Jada had no such trouble with memories and walked right into the closet. She walked to the back, put her palm against the wall, and then turned to look at me.

"Now what?"

I didn't know. I'd been expecting something. Something scary, some sign of what to do next. Anything really.

I lifted up my orb camera and saw Mary's red orb hovering very near Jada's shoulder. It was moving closer to her. The hair on that side of Jada’s head began to extend, as if reaching for the orb of light. She saw it too.

"Aaron, something’s happening." She didn't sound as scared as I would have expected. Suddenly, I could see her breath.

"I'm cold," she complained.

"I know, I can tell. Hang on, I'm going to try and download her now. Just be still. Maybe she finds you comforting."

I focused the camera on Mary. Her orb was hovering just over Jada's collarbone. I hit the download button and all of the sudden, the orb twitched to a new location.

It came to rest just over Jada's heart.

The box around the orb on my camera began to shrink, telling me that the process was in motion.

"I feel..." Jada began and then her voice cut out with a sort of hiccupping noise. Her eyes bulged and then her head was thrown back. Her arms, too, extended and seemed to be being pulled by an invisible force straight backward.

"Hang on Jada," I said. "Almost there."

I noticed with some alarm that, as the box around Mary's orb shrank, the orb itself was slowly changing colors. What had started as an intense red began to get deeper and deeper until it was crimson. Then it began to shift in to a dark purple. Finally, as the box locked into place and the download was completed, Mary's orb had lightened to a vibrant purple. It looked like the light saber color that some of the Jedi have. Not the main ones but the side characters.

The orb didn't disappear. It stayed right there on Jada's chest. I dropped the camera from in front of my face and was alarmed when I could see the orb without it.

Jada was still stuck in her strange, contorted position. She began to shake back and forth and make a noise. It was like a long, low ’Uuuuhhhhhhhhh...’

I was more than a little scared. I took a step forward, crossing the threshold of the closet, trying to get to Jada, to help her. I found myself thrown backward onto the floor.

My head hit the hardwood and bounced off. I saw a bright flash of red in my head at the moment of impact and lay there, too dazed to move.

Eventually, I sat up. I wasn't really sure how long it had been but I was very concerned about Jada. I couldn't see her any longer and she wasn't making that noise anymore.

Without thinking, I ran into the closet. I realized it was a mistake too late. For whatever reason, though, I was allowed entry this time.

Toward the back of the closet, I found her. The sight of her made my blood run cold. Dark hair hanging down as she cradled her face in her hands. Sobbing.

It was the exact same scene from my dream.

"Jada?" I asked. I was praying she would respond. Of course, she didn't.

"Jada?" I repeated. I reached down and touched her shoulder. The sobbing stopped immediately.

Slowly, painfully slowly, Jada turned to look at me. Only she didn't look like Jada. Not exactly.

Her eyes were gone.

They'd been replaced by two bright pools of vibrant purple.