Mindless; Chapter 16

There's a knock on my door and I shove my notes into the desk drawer. I turn to find Cynthia in the doorway.

She smiles at me. "The Council was wondering if you would be willing to meet them today."

I suddenly feel like Eren and Ace being called off was intentional. The darkness makes its irritation known. I stand. "I suppose if I say no now, I won't have a choice later."

"Sadly."

xXxXx

Cynthia stands with me outside the door to the council's room. "Would you like me to wait out here for you?"

I look at the door. "Sure."

The door opens and I'm motioned in.

"I'll be right out here."

I can hear the door shut behind me. Whether it was by the guard outside the door or the one that's been trailing me since I left my room, I'm not sure, but I don't bother looking back. The council sits watching me from behind their long, shared, curved bench. A chair sits in front of their bench, clearly meant for me. As I approach it, the darkness is oddly silent, but I can feel it watching.

I sit down, the guard standing behind me, and examine the men watching me. I only recognize Chancellor Langston of the five. The one next to him looks vaguely familiar though, but I can't figure out why. Each has a guard standing behind them with more standing about the chamber. I can hear the darkness planning and plotting out different plans of attack.

"Gwen," Chancellor Langston says, drawing my attention to him, "Thank you for coming."

"I wouldn't exactly say I had a choice."

"Allow me to introduce you to the rest of the council," he carries on, motioning to the man farthest left, "Chancellors Barns," his hand carries down the line and switches to the other hand to motion to those to his other side, "McNamara, Harvey, and Pond."

Each chancellor nods to me as Langston says their name. I just let my eyes slide from one to the next. The darkness doesn't like any of them, Harvey least of all. I study him for a few seconds extra. He sits perfectly still. I can tell his full attention is on me. His eyes don't betray any emotion, yet I swear I can see cold calculations running in them.

"What do you want to know?" I ask.

Barns leans forward. "What do you know about where you were before here?"

I shrug. "Not much. My memory is pretty much blank."

McNamara opens a folder in front of him, "Let us share what we have, perhaps that might spark a memory. Where you were is referred to as the Facility by the Order. From our intel, they were working on a project that would help them destroy the Remnant. Were you a part of this 'project'?"

I don't know what the Order or Remnant are, but I'm sure it's safe to assume that the Facility is where I had been. Had our training been to destroy this 'Remnant'? "It's possible we were," I reply. I instantly regret my choice of words, the darkness slamming against its barrier.

McNamara looks up from the folder. "Pardon?"

"Do you mean to say you weren't alone in the Facility?" Pond asks.

"I was Subject 45," I tell them hesitantly.

The chancellors are silent for a second before Barns speaks. "Subject 45 of forty-five subjects or were there more?"

My last memory from the Facility comes to mind. There couldn't have been more than ten present. I had never considered there being more. The only other ones I could remember were 44 and 39. Was I their last subject or were there more? If they had started with subject one, what had happened to the rest of them? Had they all died in the Fracturing Phase? From the sound of it, I had been the only subject found at the Facility. What had happened to the rest? Had they gone through the Fracturing Phase? Were they alive and like me? Had they died during the Fracturing Phase? Had they simply been moved to another location? Or had the Controllers ordered that they be eliminated as I had survived the Fracturing Phase and they only needed one of us like this?

The darkness slams against its barrier, snapping me back into focus. It tells me to stay alert and shut up.

The memories I have of the Facility begin to swim back to the surface of my thoughts and the darkness slams them down. Something tells me it won't be letting me touch them.

The call of my name snaps my focus back to the council. They all study me curiously.

"Gwen," Langston says, drawing my attention to him, "How many were at the Facility?"

I shake my head. "I don't know."

"An approximation then,” he coaxes me gently.

I shake my head again. I can see Subject 44 falling back in my mind. I can feel phantom pains something tells me are from whatever they did to me during the Fracturing Phase. I can feel my arm shaking. "No more than ten, maybe. I don't know."

"What happened to them?" Harvey asks, voice as calm and cold as his eyes.

The darkness churns angrily at his voice. I open my mouth but snap it shut at the darkness's insistence not to tell him anything. Not that it matters, I can only assume that they were killed. That would only lead to having to talk about Subject 44's death, which I don't particularly feel like telling them about.

"Gwen?" He presses.

"I'm sorry. I'm not ready to talk about this."

"Why not?" There’s no mistaking the challenge in his tone.

"Harvey," Pond chides him.

"Should we have you seeing a psychologist?" Langston asks. "Cynthia mentioned, and your medical records from here concur, that you've been having reoccurring blackouts."

McNamara starts. "This is the first I'm hearing of this."

My vision goes red. "Give me a pestering shrink and I'll slit their throat," my voice growls. My vision clears and I'm sure my shock mirrors that of the expressions of the chancellors. "That wasn't- I didn't-. . ." How could I possibly make them understand there was a darkness in my head that only wanted blood. "I don’t. . .”

"These recorded blackouts have noted that you don't remember what happens and say that you're not in control," Langston states. "Is that what we just witnessed?"

I nod.

"From what you can remember," Pond begins gently, "Has this been a condition you've always had?"

I shake my head. "As far as I can tell, it's a result of. . ." I can feel the darkness pressing close, threatening me.

"Allow us to offer a quid pro quo," McNamara says, holding the file up. "This file was recovered when the Remnant rescued you from the Facility. It was in a bag that we can only assume the doctor had you hold onto for him.”

von Wen's promise flashes through my mind; that he would tell me my name and anything I wanted to know. That's how he was going to be able to do so. He had stolen my file from the Doctor.

Harvey and Pond glance towards him in surprise. They must not have agreed to this, but I didn't care.

"What's in it?" I ask.

Langston shrugs. "Nothing we found useful. Perhaps it will mean something to you."

The darkness rises up and I shove it down with all the strength I have. "What do you want to know?"

"The other subjects, what happened to them?" Harvey asks, beating the rest of them to the punch. I can see Barns frowning at his choice of question. Yet I don’t hesitate to answer.

"I don't know. I only know that they killed one of them." I can see 44 falling back in my mind.

"Why?" McNamara asks, shocked.

"I can't remember," I lie.

"You were beginning to say earlier that you believed these blackouts to be a result of something," Barns says. "What do you think these blackouts are a result of and why?"

"The-"

All I see is black.