Chapter 14: The Missing Summer
Chapter 14: The Missing Summer
No one spoke.
The photograph lay in the center of the table.
An eleven-year-old girl stared back at them with gray-blue eyes and a guarded expression.
Emily reached out slowly.
Her fingers trembled as she traced the faded scar above the girl's left eyebrow.
The scar was real.
She still carried it.
For years she had believed she got it falling from a sailboat during a family vacation in Maine.
That was the story Arthur had told everyone.
That was the story she remembered.
Now she wasn't sure she remembered anything at all.
Dr. Allison Reed broke the silence.
"We've already compared the facial landmarks."
She placed another report beside the photograph.
"Ninety-nine-point-eight percent match."
Emily looked at the report without really seeing it.
"I don't remember this place."
Dr. Reed nodded.
"I believe you."
Memory loss following severe psychological trauma wasn't impossible.
Neither was chemically induced amnesia.
But this...
This was different.
Eleanor stared at the photograph as tears slowly formed in her eyes.
"I remember the summer."
Emily turned toward her.
"What summer?"
"The summer you disappeared."
Emily frowned.
"I never disappeared."
Eleanor closed her eyes.
"That's what they wanted us to believe."
Arthur slowly lowered his head.
"I told everyone you were at sailing camp."
Emily's pulse quickened.
"What?"
"It lasted six weeks."
"I remember sailing camp."
Arthur looked up.
"No."
His voice cracked.
"You remember what they wanted you to remember."
Mercer immediately opened a notebook.
"Explain."
Arthur rubbed his forehead.
"It was twenty-three years ago."
"A man came to my office."
"He said the government had selected Emily for an advanced youth leadership program."
Emily stared at him.
"You agreed?"
Arthur nodded once.
"They showed credentials."
"They knew things only federal agencies should have known."
Eleanor interrupted sharply.
"I told you not to sign."
Arthur closed his eyes.
"I know."
Flashbacks began surfacing inside Emily's mind.
Not complete memories.
Fragments.
A long white hallway.
Children wearing identical gray uniforms.
Someone calling out numbers instead of names.
A loud bell.
A classroom.
She squeezed her eyes shut.
A sharp pain shot through her temples.
Eleanor immediately noticed.
"What is it?"
Emily whispered,
"I hear..."
"Hear what?"
"A song."
Everyone looked at her.
"What song?" Mercer asked.
Emily struggled to describe it.
"A lullaby."
"I've heard it before."
"It won't stop."
Dr. Reed leaned forward.
"Can you hum it?"
Emily hesitated.
Then softly hummed the melody.
Only four notes.
Simple.
Gentle.
Before she finished...
Eleanor's face turned white.
"No..."
Arthur looked equally shaken.
Mercer frowned.
"You know it?"
Eleanor whispered,
"I used to sing that to her."
Emily stopped.
"But..."
Eleanor slowly shook her head.
"I stopped singing it after she came home."
Mercer looked between them.
"Why?"
Neither parent answered.
Finally Arthur spoke.
"Because she cried every time she heard it."
The room became quiet again.
Emily's breathing grew uneven.
The melody still echoed in her mind.
Along with another image.
A door.
Steel.
Painted white.
The number 12.
Someone standing beside her.
A little boy.
Dark hair.
Gray-blue eyes.
He smiled.
Then someone pulled him away.
Emily gasped.
"Ethan."
Eleanor stepped forward.
"You remember him?"
"I think..."
Emily pressed a hand against her forehead.
"I knew him before he disappeared."
Arthur nodded sadly.
"You did."
A technician entered the command center carrying a sealed evidence box.
"We found another item inside the clinic."
Mercer looked up.
"What is it?"
"A cassette tape."
Everyone stared.
"A cassette?"
The technician nodded.
"It was hidden inside an air vent."
"No label."
"No fingerprints."
Minutes later...
An old cassette player had been connected inside the mobile lab.
The tape hissed loudly before a woman's voice emerged.
Calm.
Professional.
Clinical.
Session 47. Subject: L-12-07.
Emily froze.
The recording continued.
Memory suppression progressing normally.
No one moved.
The voice continued.
Subject continues asking for her brother.
Emily felt her stomach tighten.
Another voice appeared.
Small.
Frightened.
A little girl's voice.
"I want Ethan."
Emily's eyes widened.
It was her own voice.
Twenty-three years younger.
The therapist answered gently.
Ethan isn't real anymore.
The child began crying.
"No..."
"I promised I'd find him."
The recording crackled.
Then another unfamiliar voice entered.
Cold.
Controlled.
Female.
Increase dosage.
Silence.
Then the therapist asked,
Authorization code?
The woman answered without hesitation.
The Queen authorizes full reset.
The tape ended.
No one inside the command center spoke for several long moments.
Mercer finally pressed Stop.
The click sounded deafening.
Emily stared at the cassette player.
"They erased him."
Eleanor nodded slowly.
"They erased your memories."
Arthur whispered,
"And mine."
Everyone looked at him.
"What?"
Arthur rubbed his shaking hands together.
"I remember signing papers."
"I remember dropping her off."
He looked utterly confused.
"But..."
"I don't remember bringing her home."
Dr. Reed looked thoughtful.
"That's significant."
Mercer frowned.
"What are you thinking?"
She answered carefully.
"If Arthur's memories were altered too..."
"This wasn't just about Emily."
"It was about controlling everyone around her."
Suddenly, one of the intelligence analysts shouted from across the command center.
"Agent Mercer!"
Mercer hurried over.
"What did you find?"
"We enhanced the audio."
The analyst replayed the cassette.
This time, after the therapist said 'Session 47 complete,' another sound emerged beneath the static.
Footsteps.
A door opening.
Then a man spoke quietly.
Only one sentence.
She'll make an excellent successor.
Emily frowned.
"I know that voice."
Mercer looked at her.
"From where?"
"I heard it..."
She searched her memory.
"...at Father's retirement gala."
Everyone in the room fell silent.
Arthur's expression changed instantly.
"No."
Emily looked at him.
"You recognize it too."
Arthur nodded slowly.
"I do."
"Who is it?"
Arthur swallowed hard.
"It's impossible."
"Why?"
"Because..."
His voice barely rose above a whisper.
"...the man speaking died fifteen years ago."
Before anyone could respond, Mercer's secure satellite phone rang again.
He answered immediately.
"Mercer."
His expression hardened.
"What?"
The room waited.
After several seconds, he slowly lowered the phone.
Emily stepped forward.
"What happened?"
Mercer looked directly at her.
"The body recovered from Warehouse Twelve..."
Emily's pulse quickened.
"My brother?"
Mercer shook his head.
"It wasn't him."
Relief flooded through her for only a second.
Then Mercer continued.
"The dead man has finally been identified."
"Who is he?"
Mercer looked down at the report one last time before answering.
"He was one of the doctors..."
"...who participated in Session 47."
The same doctor whose voice had been recorded on the cassette.
Which meant someone had spent the last twenty-three years hunting down everyone involved in Emily's forgotten childhood.
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And only one name remained at the top of that list.
The Queen.
