Echoes of the Past - Chapter 7

 “YOU KNEW!” she yelled, her eyes flashing in outrage, her entire body shaking.

Lydecker gave her a thoughtful look before he stepped around his desk. “Max, what’s wrong?” he asked calmly.

As angry as she was, Max found herself incapable of responding to him even through she had pent up everything ever since she had woken up for this moment of confrontation. She remembered the missing bits now. Her eyes glazed over as she recalled the nightmare.

Her swollen eyes watched in helpless desperation as they drug Ben’s limp body out. Was he alive? Was he dead? Why didn’t she say something? Why didn’t she try to stall them, to lie to them? Why did she have to be so stubborn, to keep her mouth shut?

“No…Leave him alone, you bastards!” she shouted one last time as Ben disappeared from her sight and the door slammed shut.

Then it all went silent.

She did not know how long she was left alone in the dark. Time ceased to mean anything to her, only her pain and her last memories of seeing Ben. How could they? How could they do this to Ben? Silent tears streamed down her cheeks. She wished she could have done something. She wished that she could have stopped them.

The door swung open, bringing in a gust of fresh air and a stream of light from the corridor outside.

“Where’s he?” she snarled when the boss strode into the room.

He merely sneered at her. “He’s no use to us now. We’ve…disposed of him.”

Max’s throat constricted as her heart stopped. No. He couldn’t have possibly meant it. Not Ben. Her eyes burned with her unshed tears and her breath caught. Denial rang in her head. No, not Ben! But somehow, the rational part of her mind managed to assert itself, making her remember the state Ben had been in when she had last seen him.

Her blood began to boil.

Then a growl escaped her throat.

She wanted to kill them.

She wanted them DEAD. All of them!

The boss motioned for the militants to follow him. Taking a few steps closer to her, his sneer turned into a leer. “Now, it’s just you and…us. Your friend can’t save you. He can’t even save himself.”

Max spat at him with all the venom she could muster. Her entire body shook with pent up rage and adrenaline. She knew she was hurt badly, but somehow, the physical pain was nothing compared to the mental torture of knowing Ben’s demise.

A cold hand gripped her chin, forcing her to face a pair of glittering black eyes. “I think I know how we can make you talk.” His voice was disgustingly oily.

There was no further warning.

The next thing Max heard was a loud rip and her top was torn of her battered body. Her eyes widened in shock. She should have expected this. But still, it came as a surprise.

But then shock became anger. Mind numbing, white-hot, piercing anger as the militants lay their dirty grasping hands on her body, their mocking laughter echoing in her ears.

Anger at the unfairness of what she was forced to go through. Anger for what was done to her unit, to those she had grown up with, lying dead on the ground. All for what? For carrying out orders? For making sure that the militants did not succeed in taking over the oil-rich country for their own greedy use? For helping another country in need?

Something inside her snapped.

A surge of energy she did not realise she had coursed through her and she yanked her arms forward violently. The shackles ripped away from the wall, sending chunks of plaster and concrete flying out.

She stood there panting at the exertion, the now useless shackles dangling from her wrists and her ankles. Her internal and external restraints now demolished, her eyes glittered wildly as she stared at the group of men in front of her.

The men were looking at her, their expression displaying their disbelief at her action.

But she no longer cared about anything but her own self-preservation. It was time for retaliation for what they had done to her in the past few weeks. Her stance became predatorial.

She wanted to kill.

An animalistic snarl escaped her lips.

Someone charged at her.

With superhuman speed, she returned the attack even before he reached her. Everything happened in a blur after that as they all lunged at her at the same time. The first thing she aimed for was the weapons. Those cowards were useless without the protection of their guns.

Her muscles burned, protesting against the strain she inflicted on them by lashing out. But she carried on. She moved only by instinct, not really registering who or what her fists and her legs connected with. Ripping off their limbs, cracking their necks, she did not care what she did. All she wanted was for all of them to die.

To DIE!

Then she stood still, studying the last three militants. All their weapons lay broken on the floor.

Their bodies trembled. They stank of fear so putrid and thick that she wanted gag at the scent. Her eyes narrowing predatorily, she sneered derisively at them before she launched her attack against them. She carried on until each and every one of them lay unbreathing on the grimy floor.

She stared down at them numbly, with no feeling of remorse.

Slowly, as she stood there unmoving, sanity began to return.

Ben, she had to find Ben.

“Max?”

Max blinked rapidly as the memories faded away, leaving her with a sudden feeling of emptiness. She raised her eyes to meet Lydecker’s concerned face. Clenching her fists tightly, she fought to contain her overpowering anger.

“Don’t pretend you don’t know, Deck. You knew about Ben. That’s why you sent me here. Isn’t that right?” she accused heatedly.

Lydecker expression cleared. When he spoke, his voice was urgent. “What do you remember?”

“You sick bastard! You put me in Alec’s unit so that you can drag up all the shit that I didn’t want to remember,” she snarled, hating how her voice cracked at the end.

“Ben. You remember him?” Lydecker prompted, this time a little sternly.

Max sneered. “Yeah, Deck. Well done. Thanks for letting me in on the plan.”

A pained expression crossed his features as he touched her shoulders. “We needed to know, Max. His and yours were the only two bodies we couldn’t find.”

Her stomach heaved violently as her last memory of her unit came in a flash. She shrugged his hands off roughly. “You let me believe that you found every one of them. You didn’t tell me Ben was missing.”

Lydecker pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, I didn’t. We figured that both of you got captured. But when we found you alone, and in that condition…” He paused. Swallowing, he continued, “Sandoval tried to get you to remember, but there are chunks missing from your memory. You were not responding no matter what we tried. Your mind blocked it out, but we need to know if he survived.”

She looked down. “If he survived…” she broke off, unable to continue. When she lifted her eyes, Lydecker appeared blurred.

Dashing the tears away, she gritted out, “No. He didn’t survive. They tortured him, broke his legs, and they killed him when he refused to talk. I can’t find him after that. I tried, but they must have disposed of him.”

Lydecker blinked slowly. And then he leaned back against his desk, his eyes pinned unseeingly to a spot in the distance. He looked lost.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she choked out, hating the way her voice hitched in her throat. Damn it, she did not want to cry! “WHY?”

“You and Ben were very close,” Lydecker said slowly. At her widening eyes, he nodded, “Yes, we know about your relationship.”

“But…”

He held his hands up to stop her words. “You were good together. You balanced each other out, that’s why no one made a fuss about it,” Lydecker explained patiently. “But because you were so close, the pain must be harder to bear. The memory blackout was how your system coped with it.”

“I didn’t want to remember?” she asked in a small voice.

He shook his head sadly. “It was too painful for you to remember. Blocking it out was just a part of your survival instincts. Bringing you in close contact with Alec was our last ditch attempt at getting you to remember Ben.”

She bristled at his underhandedness. “Why didn’t you ask me straight to the face? Why the indirect approach? This is not like you, Deck!”

Pressing his thumb and finger against his forehead, Lydecker sighed heavily and said, “The psych team recommended that we let you regain your memories without force. I don’t know how much you remember of that time, but you’re not exactly strong when we found you.”

She sneered. “I was tortured physically and mentally. What did you expect?”

“You were like a wild animal when we found you. It took us days to calm you down such that you were willing to talk to us. Psych was worried that if we push you too hard, you’ll snap.”

“You could have waited for a week…maybe a month. But eighteen months?” she asked, incredulous.

“You were not well,” Lydecker insisted harshly.

“I was fine! I was fine for at least a year now!”

Lydecker slammed his palms against the desk, his expression tight. “No you’re not. You attacked your previous teammates back in Wyoming more than once and you made no effort in integrating yourself into the units. And now, you’re just unpredictable. That was not the behaviour of the Max we know.”

Max fell silent. Did she change that much? Was it in the way she treated others, the way she fought, and the way she wrapped a wall around herself? Yes, she had changed, she admitted to herself.

Her voice was dull when she finally spoke. “That Max died when the rest of her unit died.”

“No, Max. You’re still the same person. And you’ve been getting better ever since you came here.”

“I’ve been having more nightmares ever since I came here.”

“You need to deal with your past to continue living. What you were doing in Wyoming was just existing like a damned machine!”

Max snorted derisively. “Genetically engineered super-soldiers. Machines are engineered. Humans are not.”

“You’re going to stop referring to yourself like that, Max,” Lydecker rapped out irritably.

Suddenly running out of steam, she leaned back and slowly slid down the wall to end up a heap on the floor. She was so tired, so tired of facing everything, of all the dark, painful memories. Tired of trying to deal with something she just could not cope with.

Lydecker looked worried. “Max, get up,” he ordered firmly.

Ignoring his orders, Max just stared down at her hands. They looked small and harmless, but she knew that her hands had been stained by the blood of the many people she had killed. Her expression hardened as her hands clenched. But if she had to do it again, she would. For what they had done to her and Ben, she would gladly kill them all over again.

She closed her eyes. “He was alive when they brought him in, but barely. His leg was probably not the only thing they’d broken. They beat me up in front of him to get him to talk.”

Lydecker crouched down in front of her, but he did not speak.

“He didn’t break. He asked them to stop but he did not tell them about us.” She paused, inhaling a calming breath. “Then they took it out on him as well, hoping that I would talk.”

“You didn’t either,” Lydecker added knowingly.

Max shook her head slowly, her lips twisting. “No. I didn’t talk. The last thing I saw was Ben being dragged out.”

Lydecker’s eyes flickered. “Did you see them kill him?”

Max blinked back the tears. “He couldn’t have survived it. He was not breathing. His chest was not moving.”

“Where is he now, Max?”

“I told you. I searched for him when I escaped, but I couldn’t find him.”

“He could still be alive.”

Max looked at him sharply. Lydecker sounded as if he knew something.

“Alive? After so long?” she asked angrily. “But if you forced me to remember this earlier, he might be! We could have saved him!”

“And what? Drive you insane in the process?”

She stood up abruptly, her eyes flashing angrily. “I wouldn’t have cared if I died if it meant that he could live!”

Lydecker sighed. “Look, now that you remember, there’s something you need to know.”

Her eyes narrowed slightly. “What?”

“We need to find out where the militants are based.”

“I thought they were wiped out,” she exclaimed, incredulous.

Shaking his head, Lydecker said, “No. We took down a few of their cells. Our intelligence said that there should only be one more left. The main headquarters.”

“Why are you telling me this now, Deck?” she gritted out tightly. “After all this time? Why not earlier?”

 

“Because I need you to remember if you’ve seen or heard anything which might give us a clue as to where their headquarters is.”

Max just stared at him.

Alec placed his hand against the wall, suddenly finding it hard to breathe.

So that was why Lydecker had assigned Max to his unit. Because he looked like Max’s dead partner. And from the sounds of it, Ben was more than just a mission partner to Max. He was her partner in a more intimate sense.

Ben. That was the name she had called out when he had gone to her room last night. It was Ben’s chest that she had buried her face in. The one she trusted.

Not him. Not Alec.

But Ben.

The twisting feeling in his gut was unfamiliar, but he could guess what it meant. He was jealous. He was jealous of a guy who was dead. The thought that Max only saw Ben when she looked at him was something which made him sick to the pit of his stomach.

He groaned when he realised what he was thinking. Biggs had been right. He had a thing for Max.

When did it happen? How could he have let it creep up to him like that?

There were so many questions running through his mind that he did not know where he should start the unravelling process. Everything was just too confusing.

Her scars, her emotional state, her crazy ideas of saving others; it all made sense now. The stupid girl was feeling guilty that she had survived and no one else did. And now that Lydecker had meddled in the entire thing by throwing Max close to someone who resembled Ben, she needed to deal with the guilt of surviving while Ben had been beaten to death right in front of her eyes to get her to talk.

It also explained her weird reaction to him. More than once, he had caught her looking at him with an odd expression on her face and had not been able to figure out why. A harsh laugh escaped his lips. Now he knew why. She had been thinking about Ben. No doubt comparing him with Ben.

What about the kiss they shared in the stairwell? Had she responded that way because of Ben as well? Had her mind been filled with the memories of her lover when she returned the kiss?

With a groan, Alec closed his eyes and rested his head against the wall. He should not have followed her here. But he had been anxious when she just ran off. Look where it got him? This was the last thing he needed right now.

The pain, the guilt of losing Sam suddenly came back to him. He had been guilty of not lending Sam his support when she needed it. Sam had needed someone to understand her back then, but he was too wrapped up in his own feelings to pay enough attention. After that, it was too late for him to do anything. Too late for anything but regrets.

Alec would not repeat his mistake. He understood how Max felt. And after listening to her and Lydecker, he realised that he understood even more.

The girl did not do anything wrong. But knowing Max, she thought otherwise, consciously or unconsciously.

Alec stiffened his resolve. If she did not want to listen to anyone telling her that it was not her fault, then he guessed he would just have to show her. After all, now that she was in his unit, he was responsible for her welfare.

And he would not let his personal feelings get in the way.

She opened the door, and immediately stiffened in surprise when she found Alec standing there looking stunned. Quietly, she shut the door behind her.

He heard them. Alec had heard her conversation with Lydecker. How could he eavesdrop on something so private? She wanted to yell at him, but the expression on his face held her back.

They looked at each other wordlessly.

And then Alec broke the silence. “Come on. Let’s get you back to your cell.”

She blinked. This was not what she expected from him. Not his calm, reassuring words. She had expected him to taunt her.  To laugh at her at her expense. For a moment, her anger surged again.

And then something tugged at her memory. She bit her lips, remembering how Alec had cradled her in his arms, soothing her. She also remembered that in the haziness of her half-awake state that she had thought that he was Ben.

He had been nothing but reassuring and concerned at that time. Very much like how he was now.

Unsure of what she should say and confused about her own state of mind, she just nodded at him. Silently, they made their way across the compound, thankfully not meeting anyone they knew on the way. She was in no mood to be answering unwanted questions at the moment.

Upon reaching the door to her cell, she paused. Hesitantly, she turned around to find Alec looking at her. She had yet to thank him, she realised.

“Thank you,” she said quietly. “For last night.”

He blinked at her. And then, expelling a breath of air, he said, “I heard what you said in there. I’m sorry.”

Her smile was watery. “I guess it worked. I finally remember everything. Well, kind of.”

Alec gazed at her wordlessly for a moment before he reached out to wrap an arm around her shoulders. “Everything is going to be alright.”

She sniffed, hating how pathetic she sounded. Then she looked up at him. “Why are you being so nice?”

“Huh?” He dropped his arm.

“You’re never this nice to me,” she pointed out, her eyes turning suspicious.

A flash of irritation surged within him. Was it so wrong for him to be pleasant to her? Was that just the privilege she afforded the rest but not him? He opened his mouth to set her straight. But before he could say a word, he detected a glimmer of uncertainty in her expression.

His eyes softened. “Hey, we’re a team. We look out for each other.”

Max exhaled a shuddering breath and Alec turned her around to wrap her close to him. She sniffed into his shirt, hating how vulnerable she was feeling at that moment. His heart thudded strongly against her ear, its steady beat calming her frazzled being. The scent that she had come to associate as Alec enveloped her protectively.

In other words, she felt safe.

Somehow, her walls she had so carefully built had shattered with the return of the missing pieces of her memory. It was as if she did not have the energy to keep the barriers up.

Not anymore.

Next>>