The Lab

Bright lights danced across her eyelids, illuminating the hazy clouds to a warm orange. Everything hurt; pain raced through muscle and bone and the gnarled sinew holding her broken body together. As Erica began to wake from whatever bout of unconsciousness she had just experienced, external sensory stimulus lay siege to her body, fighting with the inner pain across the synapses of her mind.

"We can't do that. I'm a doctor, I vowed to do no harm."

Erica didn't recognize the voice. She attempted to open her eyes, breaking the crust that had sealed them shut.

"Leonard, she's waking. We can't sedate her, she'll probably die. If what you said is true, if this woman can somehow transform her body into a brain wave and take control of another human being, pain is the only safe way for us to contain her."

"No. This is wildly unethical. You're FBI."

FBI. Leonard Crow. It had taken Erica a moment to recognize these familiar terms, but it jump-started her memory. She was on the run, hounded by a rookie FBI agent: Crow.

"We don't have a choice, Dr. Jackson. This woman is a walking atom bomb."

Erica recognized the voice of the redheaded FBI agent.

"She can possess anybody. ANYBODY! You, me, one of the Joint Chiefs, hell the President. Dr. Wallace, you're sure?"

The streaks of white light that had dominated Erica's vision began to recede into smaller orbs with smudges of peach and blue encroaching upon them. Erica still couldn't see any of the people surrounding her with clarity.

"Dr. Lin, you've been quiet."

Head-like shapes began to take form from the swirl of color Erica was seeing. So far she could only make out three people surrounding her.

"We're in a parking garage, about to intentionally cause harm to a woman likely bleeding internally. Dr. Jackson is right, this is wildly unethical. But I saw it. I believe you, Leonard, about her ability. I don't like it, but what other option do we have? We'll make sure the damage is superficial."

Finally able to detect four distinct blobs of people standing over her, Erica tried to push herself up from whatever surface she had been lying on.

"We need to do it now."

Hands pressed against Erica's cold skin at Crow's orders. The pressure jostled her injuries as they grabbed and pulled at her wrists and ankles. A yelp of pain escaped Erica's mouth.

"Do it, Dr. Wallace."

A syringe pierced through Erica's delicate skin on her left arm, fractions of an inch above her elbow. The needle itself caused her no bother, yet the liquid payload it delivered seared inside her veins. Erica cried out in agony, contorting and shaking her body under the restraints of the doctors' hands.

"I've got cuffs."

Erica's vision had steadily sharpened; she could now see the bespectacled faces of her torturers. She identified the one wincing at her every strained moan as Dr. Jackson. She continued to writhe underneath their firm grip until she saw Crow return with several sets of silver handcuffs.

Erica's voice quickly became hoarse from overuse and thirst. Her eyes darted back and forth between the physicians like a caged animal. She could feel the interference from the pain, the electrical signals traveling between her brain, extremities, even her own organs. She felt feral, unable to think, unable to feel the minds of the men standing so close, so within her grasp.

Erica drifted in and out of consciousness as the pain swirled inside of her. After untold time spent under the doctors' unflinching gadgets, Erica found herself laying on her belly with a large needle impaling her spine. She stared to the side, belt level of one of the doctors, dead inside, emotionless. She had become numb to the physical pain, yet still succumbed to the traffic jam of activity clogging her mind.

"Spinal fluid extracted."

As the doctors rolled Erica onto her back, a moment of clarity emerged. Perception regained its feeling as she was better able to process sensory information. An alarm sounded, dictating the beat of her heart.

"Another injection, Wallace."

Erica's heart was racing when she heard Crow bark the order. As she turned her head to look at him, the sweet, metallic taste of another person began to hum in her mind, building up to a deafening roar.

Erica seized the brief moment she had and pulled herself into Crow's mind. With her pain now being split between two nervous systems, murderous machinations were free to float about her unburdened mind. She glared at the scientists through Crow's eyes, watching as they processed the now-empty table. At the edge of her vision, Erica saw a tray of instruments. She reached for a scalpel and threw it into the air behind the doctors.

Erica retracted herself from Crow and emerged behind the doctors as the scalpel was arriving. Reaching to grab the instrument, the scalpel sliced into Erica's hand as she caught it. Erica lifted her knee and kicked Dr. Lin in the back, sending him sprawling over the table.

The other doctors shrieked at Erica's reappearance and one turned to run. Erica quickly pulled herself into the runner's mind and reemerged in front of the doctor. With a quick jab, Erica's scalpel smoothly punctured the doctor's neck. As she removed the weapon, blood splattered everywhere, a ruby fountain of mayhem covering Erica, the doctor, and the rough concrete of the parking garage.

Dr. Lin had arched his neck and lay on the table agape, speechless. Erica deliberately shuffled back to the table, scalpel tightly gripped, and swung the short blade at the doctor's left eye. The blade sliced through eyelid and grazed the eyeball, leaving an unnoticeable blemish on Lin's eye. He screamed in pain until Erica plunged the scalpel into his spine, cutting the agony short with a quick yelp. Dr. Lin's head hang limp off the edge of the table.

Turning to the final doctor, Erica left the scalpel in Lin's back. Her head tilted slightly as she gauged the two men still standing. The last doctor began to back away with slow, careful steps.

Erica sidestepped the table and reached out a bloodied hand, grabbing at the white lab coat. She pulled the doctor in and cocked back her free hand. In one smooth motion, Erica brought her fist down upon the doctors cheek and knelt to the floor as he collapsed from the blow. Erica swung one leg over the doctor, straddling him, and continued to pound on his face, smashing his nose. The sickening crack of a cheek bone breaking was only interrupted by the clicking of the safety mechanism on a gun.

Erica spun, smacking the gun out of Crow's hands. She stood up as Crow began to backpedal and reached for the scalpel still buried in Dr. Lin's back. Bringing the weapon up for a strike, Erica paused; the chaos in her head had begun to subside. She saw horror distorting Crow's face and looked around the garage floor at the blood and destruction she had caused. Her face softened as she processed her actions. The scalpel dropped from her hand and the clanging of metal on concrete echoed throughout the structure. With her eyes still intensely locked with Crow's, Erica began to back away, realizing that Crow was the only brain wave left she could detect.

Erica grimaced as she struggled to open the door to the parking garage. The adrenaline of two bodies had worn off and left her weak. As she slipped through the door, she looked back once more at Crow and the three doctors that lay dead, and then disappeared into the night.