<Episode 31>

“Noooo!”, somebody yelled out.

Rachel woke up startled, looking around for the source of the scream. Then she realized who it was and looked over at Jack. He was sitting up in his cot breathing hard as usual. Again with that nightmare. She laid her head back down on her pillow knowing he wasn’t going to talk about it. Rachel looked back at him. He swung his legs over the edge of the cot, his head down and his hands holding the back of his head. As usual he looked terrified at what he dreamt. She knew he wasn’t going to talk about it, he never did. She started to ask anyway, “Jack…?”

“I’m fine,” he said cutting her off. “I’m… I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine,” she told him bluntly. Rachel cared for Jack but this was getting out of hand.

“It’s nothing alright, just let it go and go back to sleep.”

“Why don’t you take your own advice,” she shot back. He didn’t exactly argue. “And it’s definitely not nothing if you keep waking up screaming every night.”

“I said it’s nothing,” he snapped at her. “I told you that I’d tell you when I couldn’t handle it.”

“Oh yeah,” she said sarcastically, “you’re handling whatever it is great. I can’t wait to see what you can’t handle.” He didn’t reply so she lay her head back down and turned her back toward him. Rachel listened for a few moments. She heard him start moving and turned around to see him getting dressed. “Where are you going?”

“Business,” was all he said as he put his shoes on.

“Business?”, she asked not getting it.

“As in none of yours,” he said sharply and headed for the door.

Rachel just turned back over while he left the room. If that idiot didn’t want to tell her what’s going on, so be it. If he wanted to suffer through this alone, then it was no skin off her nose. So what if his nightmares were slowly getting worse? So what if it got amped up since he had to…? She quickly got out of bed and pulled on her jeans and shoes and went to look for him. Seeing hardly anybody in the hallway she asked the first person she saw, “Did you see where Jack went?”

“Yeah, he stormed past me going that way,” he pointed behind him. “He looked pretty pissed, you two have a fight or something?”

“Something,” she said as she hurried past him. Rachel found him in no time. He didn’t even look like he knew where he was going, just walking around. “Jack, wait up.” He ignored her. “Would you talk to me,” she said in frustration.

Suddenly he turned around and shouted, “Leave me alone!” She took a step back in surprise from his outburst. People in the rooms around them came out to see what was happening. Then she noticed he wasn’t looking at her. Jack was looking at something to his right, but there wasn’t anything there but the wall. After a moment he finally looked at her. She wasn’t sure but it looked like he didn’t know she was there until just now. He walked off again silently as everybody watched them. She had no idea what to make of that.

***

Melissa had wanted to put this off for as long as possible. She was willing to ignore him screaming in the middle of the night. Hell, she had a few nightmares recently herself. But from what the others were telling her about last night she knew she couldn’t put this off any longer. Dusty told her he was going through some things, she should have pushed him a little harder for info back then. Finding him in an empty cafeteria she slowly approached him. He looked up with an annoyed look on his face, “Great, now the emotion reader wants to psycho analyze me.”

“I just want to talk Jack,” she said ignoring that comment. “You want to tell me what happened last night?”

“Nothing happened last night,” he answered sounding even more annoyed.

“You yelled at Rachel last night. Something had to have happened.”

Jack turned away looking embarrassed, “I didn’t yell at Rachel.”

She sat across from him, “People are telling me you did.”

“Then they saw wrong,” he snapped. A little more subdued he asked, “Did… did Rachel say I yelled at her?”

“No,” a wave of relief washed over him, briefly covering the turmoil inside him. “She said you were yelling at something, but she was pretty sure it wasn’t her. But you had to be yelling at something, so what was it.”

“Nothing,” repeated.

“Jack, you don’t yell ‘Leave me alone’ at nothing.”

“There was a fly buzzing my head and I got pissed,” he said really sounding annoyed now. “You got an answer, are you happy now?”

“All that for a fly?”, she asked not believing a word.

“I couldn’t swat at it, it could have been somebody’s cousin for all I knew.” Now he was trying to hide behind humor. This was going no where fast. “Do you want me to apologize to Rachel in front of everybody now?”

“If you think you need to go right ahead.” Jack turned his attention back to the floor. “I know we’re not the best of friends, but I like to think you would trust me enough to tell me what’s going on.”

“There’s nothing going on,” he said getting up from the table and walked away from her.

Not leaving her seat she said, “You’re apparently the only one who thinks so. Everybody can see something is bothering you.”

He turned around and faced her, “The only thing bothering me is that nobody around here can mind their own damn business and leave me alone.”

She watched him leave, the emotions coming from him were such a jumble she couldn’t make sense of them. Whatever was going on was not going to be good when it finally hit the ceiling. Melissa thought back to when he first arrived. She could definitely see a difference in him as time went on. If she had to be honest she saw a difference from the first time she saw him and then. Back then she put it down to the stress of being on the run. Except he never really seemed to recover. Occasionally she saw a spark of the man who saved her, but they were getting few and far between. At the moment she was doubting if they could get him out of whatever hole he was digging for himself.

***

Jack sat by himself in the common area trying to fight off the tiredness he was feeling. What a joke he became over the last few months. Here he was a grown man and he was getting his ass kicked by a nightmare. He’d have no problem getting a handle on it of the damn thing stopped getting worse. Just about every Drakan he fought and killed was showing up.

And he would kill at this point if they stopped showing up when he awake. He just happened to look up and saw a blue mantis looking at him from across the way. As usual nobody else was acting like they saw him. Jack closed his eyes and willed it away. When he opened them again not only was it still there it was closer too. He squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his hands to his face, why wouldn’t they go away? This was the fifth one in the past hour and they won’t go away.

“Mister Davidson?”, a small voice spoke to him.

Jack opened his eye and looked up. The mantis was gone but a little girl was in it’s place. Her human form shifted a bit as he startled her. “Sorry kid,” he said trying to calm down. Jack recognized her and her bear from the first day he was here, “Is your brother threatening to throw Polly in the rafter again?”

“No,” she answered while shaking her head.

“Was there something else you wanted then?”, he asked trying to keep the annoyance out of his voice.

“No,” she repeated and retreated back a couple of steps. Ok, he failed that one.

“Then what are you doing here sweetie?”. He finally got himself under control enough to sound normal. She took a couple of steps foreword.

“You looked sad,” she answered.

“I looked sad?”, that took him by surprise. “So you decided to come over and cheer me up?”

“Polly wanted to cheer you up.”

“Oh she did?”, Jack replied acting surprised. “Then you and Polly already brightened my day,” he smiled at her but she didn’t return it. Slowly she came foreword and put the bear in his hands, “You’re giving me Polly?”

“Polly wanted to stay with you until you stopped being scared.” Now she started looking upset. Yeah, this was going to work out well.

“So Polly,” he said to the bear, “why did you want to stay with me?” Jack put the bear to his ear and used his finger to bob it’s head up and down like it was talking. “Why yes, I am a good looking man but… what was that?” The little girl watched him intently. “Oh I see, we got to tell her.” He put the bear in front of him and looked at the kid. “Polly didn’t want to tell you but she’s sad too.”

“Why is Polly sad?”.

“She doesn’t want to leave you,” he answered. “I don’t want Polly to be sad, do you?”. Jack handed the bear back to her. She looked confused but slowly took the bear back. “If Polly’s happy I’ll be happy.”

“Ok,” she said.

“Jennifer,” somebody called out. A woman Jack guessed was the girl mother walked toward them. “I’m sorry she’s bothering you.”

“She wasn’t bothering me,” Jack told her. To the kid he said, “No you keep Polly safe now, you hear?”.

“Ok,” she said. Before she left he gave her a quick hug around the neck. When she reached her mother Jennifer put the bear to her ear. Jack had to smile as she made it’s head bob. “Polly says she hopes you feel better.”

“Thank you Polly,” he gave her a small wave. The girl waved back and went off with her mother. “Thank you too kid,” he whispered.

“Some children do have a way of brightening one’s day don’t they?”, Emily said behind him.

Jack didn’t bother turning around, “She’s a sweet kid.”

“She has a bright future ahead of her,” she commented. “As long as nobody puts any additional roadblocks in her path.”

“Is that your way of telling me to get my head back in the game?”, he said sounding a little bitter.

“No child, I just know fate has a way of throwing something at you when you least expect it.” He could feel her staring at him. “You should know that better than anyone.”

Before he could say anything something caught his attention. An owl Drakan was sitting on one of the rafters staring at him. They were always staring. “I got to go,” he said hastily as he got up and walked away. He made it to a hallway when it hit him. He felt so dizzy he had to stumble to a wall for support as images of Drakan he fought rushed through his head, a bull, the crab, the vulture and the dolphin all came at him before they went away. Jack stayed there for a long time shaking and breathing hard. When it felt like he could move again he made sure nobody saw him spazzing out and continued on his way. “What the hell is going on?”

***

“Are you quite certain about this?”, Anderson asked as he put down the report Perez gave him. If it was true then it was quite disturbing.

“I’m positive sir,” he answered. “A mole inside the organization has been supplying information to the rebels for the past month.”

“How did this supposed mole get past out background checks,” he demanded. That thing was designed to keep the rebels out of his company, not let them waltz right in.

“The rebels are getting better at forging information and creating histories,” Taylor answered as he put another file on his desk. While Anderson opened it and scanned the contents Taylor explained what it was. “This was a line of references given to us. When the initial calls were made the information was verified. With all of the Davidson sighting lately I had Mr. Perez do a little investigating on his own. All the numbers were traced to the same building.”

“An abandoned building,” Perez added.

“But why in just the past month?”, Anderson asked. “Davidson appeared unannounced at our operations before. It seems to me that if we did have a mole he or she would have been here longer than a mere month.”

“We did a check on everybody in the system,” Perez said. “Only one person profile proved to be false. And he hired in as a trucker a little over a month ago. Now it’s possible that there’s another mole here, it’s also possible Davidson had a pipeline to the rebels in those other cases. But this man is the only sure lead we have now,” he tapped his finger on the file before him. Anderson raised an eyebrow slightly and Perez quickly removed his hand from the desk.

“And record show he was one of the drivers who hauled supplies to Parker’s lab,” Taylor added. “And I saw him on the docks when Armstrong went on his little tirade about the second mark one.”

“So we have to take this one down now before he does us anymore harm,” Perez insisted.

“I agree Mr. Perez,” Anderson said thoughtfully, “but he might be able to supply us information as well.”

“I’ll send some men down to take him into custody now,” Perez said.

“Just a moment Mr. Perez,” he said. “This might also be a chance to capture a couple of rebels as well. A bit of a risk I realize, but we have an opportunity we can not pass up. Not to mention keeping any more potential conflicts from happening inside my building. We’re still repairing the damage from last time.”

“We could,” Taylor offered, “get word to the docks of another lab we’re trying to start up. And we do have some property in the industrial sector we’re not currently using.”

“I think I know the area he’s talking about,” Perez said. “If the rebels are looking for an ambush spot that would be the spot they’d be wary of.”

“Unfortunately we already used the Trojan Horse with one of our trucks so they would be looking for that as well,” Anderson told him. “I feel this is our best option. Have both R&D and medical involved as well. The more convincing this looks the better.”

***

Emily wasn’t surprised to hear the knock on her door. Despite her saying her door was always open they always knocked out of respect. Who the person was on the other side, however, took her a bit by surprise. “Rachel, please come in.”

“Thanks Emily,” she said. She looked a bit unsure of herself as she entered.

“What can I do for you child?”, Emily asked and offered her a seat. Rachel politely declined.

“I wanted to talk to you.” Quickly she added, “Not about me. God, how often do you hear that,” she was flustered about something. Emily had an idea why though.

“You want to talk about Jack,” Emily said sitting down. Rachel nodded, “He seems to be the topic of many conversations lately.”

“I know, I was wondering if you could help.”

“Do you think I can read minds child?”, she asked amused.

“No,” she replied quickly. “I mean… I know something wrong with Jack. There has been for a long time now. I was hoping you had some ideas on how to get him to open up and talk about it

“That is easier said than done child,” she told her. “Jack is a very open person, but he keeps his pain to himself. He has gotten so used to it he can hide it at a moments notice in most cases. Earlier today he was having one of his ‘episodes’. A little girl walked up to him and I could see him push his pain down so he wouldn’t affect the girl.”

“He can’t keep doing that,” Rachel said finally sitting down.

“I know child, but we can’t force him either.” She could tell from Rachel expression she didn’t want to believe that but knew it was true. “If Jack wants you or anybody to know his pain he’ll say what it is when he is ready. We have to stand by and wait until it becomes too much for him to bear on his own.”

“I can’t…,” she corrected herself, “I don’t think we should do that.”

“I realize that is not the advice you were looking for child. Unfortunately that is the only answer I have for you at the moment.” She looked unhappy but said nothing. Emily thought back to her vision, he was getting close to that state. Last night she had a dream of him falling, his darkest days were coming. The only real question was how far and how much of him could they save?

***

Jack was holding his head when Rachel found him in the garage. He was looking much worse than when she saw him this morning. Reluctantly deciding to follow Emily advice for now she tried to look normal as she walked up to him. “So this is where you been hiding,” she said keeping her tone light.

He looked up and quickly glanced at his motorcycle, “I was going to work on my bike when a headache hit me.”

“You want some aspirin or something?”

“I already took a couple,” he said, “I’m just waiting for them to kick in”

She nodded and sat next to him, “So, do want a hand with the bike?” He looked at her like she grew a second head. “What? I’m good with my hands. You’ve seen me work when we were helping Dusty.”

“Yeah but you never offered to help with the bike before.” They looked over to the door when it flew open. Melissa and the others came through looking around, “And that can’t be good.”

“Jack, I know…,” Melissa started before pausing. She looked at him strangely, almost like she was caught off guard. It took a moment for her to find her footing again, “I know I’ve been asking a lot of you lately but I think I need you for something.”

“World Inc. related right?”, he asked not looking at her but the ground.

“Unfortunately,” she admitted, “we got word they’re setting up a new lab. We don’t know what it’s for yet but Friedman able to get us a partial list of what being delivered.”

“It’s mainly medical supplies,” Arron added. “We’re not low on anything but it doesn’t hurt to stock up. And we can spread out a lot of it among the cells.” As they continued talking Rachel watched Jack out of the corner of her eye. He put a hand to his mouth and yawned.

Sparky caught it and smirked, “We keeping you up man?”

“Yes you are,” he snapped angrily. Everybody looked at him, nobody expected that reaction from him, not even her.

“Sorry man,” Sparky said a bit unsure.

“We can,” Melissa cautiously started, “ask somebody else if you’re feeling a little under the weather.”

“I can do it,” he said emotionlessly.

“You don’t have to do anything Jack,” Rachel told him. “Nobody is going to say anything if you don’t want to do one of these things.” Melissa and the others agreed. Jack looked unmoved, she rubbed his shoulder. “Come on, we’ll go get a late lunch or an early dinner.”

Jack brushed her hand away, got up and walked away saying, “How hard can it be. Show up, find out what they’re doing. Blow up whatever Drakan working for Anderson that’s obviously going to be there. You work for one side they tell you to blow up Drakan. You join the other said and what do you do? Blow up Drakan. Drakan Killer R’ Us, open twenty four seven.” He continued his rant as he left the garage. Everybody looked at her.

“What the hell was that?”, Sparky asked for them.

Rachel only had one answer for them, “I wish I knew.”

***

They gave him a wider space than usual when he got back. Good, he wanted the extra room anyway. Rachel even decided to ride in the van for this one. He really didn’t want to alienate her but he was not in the mood right now. But he did see her peek out of the van back window every so often to see if he was still there every so often. Where was he going to go if he did decide to split? Even if he did Drakan would still come after him from the whole smelling like death crap. Yeah, like he had a whole lot of options right now.

He didn’t know how long it took when he got there, all he knew was that he wanted to get this over with as fast as possible. Jack took off his helmet and froze. There were Drakan all over the place. All of them staring at him. Rachel poped out of the van and the other followed, none of them noticed. Sweat started to form on his forehead as he tried to make them go away, why wouldn’t they go away? “Jack,” Rachel said, now they decided to disappear, “we got to get into hiding. The truck going to be here soon. And we have no idea what building he’s going to go to. Arron and a couple of others went ahead to scout things out just in case.

“Right,” he replied. When she turned around he looked around quickly, not one dead Drakan was popping up. Maybe they decided to give him a break for the moment. They quickly hid the vehicles as best they could and waited. Not long afterwards a World Inc. supply truck came rolling in and stop. About then Jack realized there were an awful lot of places to hide in this place. A fact confirmed as Arron came running around the corner like a bat out of hell. “Fido get down!”

“It’s a trap!”, he yelled. He hit the ground as soon as some gunfire sounded. Jack, Rachel and the others looked up. There were shooters in the windows above them. The guy in the truck got out of the cab and started to run. He was in mid transformation as a bullet pierced his leg. Jack looked on horrified as he rolled on the ground clutching his leg. Then somebody dressed in World Inc. assault team gear calmly walked toward him. Jack saw Arron sniff the air in that direction., already knowing what he was going to say. “That’s a Drakan! Jack you got to stop him.”

He wanted to protest, but he knew he was the only one there who was technically bulletproof. “What’s one more?”, he muttered. Jack stood up and raised his left arm across his chest and the belt appeared. Another wave of dizziness rocked him as he struggled to stay on his feet. Images of the bat, octopus, mantis, hippo and goat raced at him so fast he couldn’t react. When the dizziness faded he looked over at Rachel. He knew she was saying something but he wasn’t hearing any sound come out of her mouth. Shaking his head to try to come back to his senses he got his left arm back up, swung it to the side and raised his right arm up. Before he could activate the system another wave hit him. The images wouldn’t stop. A dark green tiger, a rabbit, an elephant, a frog, Max…

…Richie…

Jack slowly lowered his hand his right arm and looked at the back of his right hand as something inside of him gave away.

***

Rachel knew something was wrong, just by the look on his face. Before she could go to him he fell to his knees looking at the back of his hand. “Jack!”, she yelled as she found her voice. Sparky looked over and saw Jack in his state and quickly helped her get him under cover. “Jack talk to me,” she said as she checked him over. It didn’t look like it he was hit, so what the hell was wrong with him? “Jack talk to me please,” she pleaded. He just stared at the back of his hand. “We need to get out of here now,” she told Sparky who didn’t argue.

“We got to cut and run!”, Sparky yelled. Arron put his head down for a moment before transforming into his wolf form and leaped in their direction. Sparky tossed him Jack’s helmet as she and him tried to get Jack into the van. Arron jumpstarted the bike and rode out of there first with them following soon after when they got Jack aboard. As they hung on for dear life, Jack was curled up into a ball next to the van’s side. Sparky crawled over and put a hand on his shoulder, “Hang in there buddy. We’ll get you fixed up as soon as we can.”

Rachel wished she could believe that but she tried to make sure Jack didn’t have any doubts. “We’ll call Dusty and Dr. Friedman. They’ll help you out.”

“Blood,” he finally said.

The first thing she did was check him over again, “Where you hit? I don’t …”

“Blood on my hands,” he said trembling. “Their blood, I killed them. I killed them and they won’t go away.” He squeezed his eyes shut and covered his head. “Make them go away.”

“Jack,” she said softly as tears started to form in her eyes. What was happening to him?