FRACTURED BY DECEIT: PSY-IV Teams #4
by Jami Gray
How long does it take for a mind to break?
Since time had long since lost meaning, I wasn’t sure, but I had a feeling I might be close to discovering the answer. Too bad I wouldn’t be in any shape to appreciate it.
“My name is Megan Rouser. I have a brother, Dev, and a sister, Keelie, and my parents…” I faltered under the smothering weight of despair. Do they even know I’m still alive? Is anyone even looking for me anymore?
Ice stroked a bitter finger along my spine, and I pressed my forehead against my drawn-up knees, squeezing my eyes tight as I rocked. My heart beat a frantic fist in my chest, making it hard to breathe. The cold finger became a claw piercing my neck. Its nails slowly sank into my mind. Agony seared me as if every nerve ending had been dipped in fire.
I threw my head back and opened my eyes to a gray fog, blind to everything but pain as my muscles seized in protest. The vicious claw tore through my brain in unrelenting demand. The pain rose to a new excruciating level. A scream tore from my raw throat and bounced off the walls until the sound encompassed my entire world. A hellish agony-infested inferno turned the blinding gray to ash.
“Give me what I want.” That sibilant voice weaved its way through the pain.
“No.” My answer never changed, because under my agony lived a deepening rage that refused to die. I no longer had any idea what the interrogator wanted or who it was. Once upon a time, before the days had blurred into one horrific endurance test after another, I had a clue, but not anymore. Now it was nothing more than a brutal entity asking the same damn question on an endless loop.
Something warm dripped over my lip as the cracks in my mind widened and stretched. The pressure on my head increased until blackness edged my mind. I reached for it, knowing the oblivion would be temporary. Still, it was better than this, anything was better than this. The never-ending nightmare didn’t leave me many options. It was getting harder to resist slipping into the dark and the final exit it offered. What would it matter if I never woke again? It wasn’t like I was going to be missed.
Hold on, Megan. The whispered demand chained me in place as a flickering outline cut through the encroaching darkness. Recognition came, but the belief that normally followed my personal talisman of hope didn’t because I no longer had faith in it. I’d been here too long, and this thing—hallucination? Apparition?—could not sustain my faith that help was coming. Not anymore.
“I'm sorry.” Why I apologized even as my heart ached, I didn’t know. Some small still-sane part of me knew my illusionary guardian wasn’t real, no matter how many times it had saved me in the past. It was nothing more than my desperate hope given form, but even that wasn’t enough anymore.
The pressure on my mind snapped away so fast that the back of my head knocked against the hard wall behind me. Freezing at the unexpected reprieve, I blinked my vision clear. My prison remained unchanged, which was no surprise since it was self-made, an attempt to stay safe—well, as safe as I could get, anyway.
Gray stone walls, like those found in a castle, surrounded me. Ragged pages filled with my rough, manic jumble of sketches of demonic eyes and faces covered the stone. Some were marred with heavy black lines as if a child had tried to scratch them out of existence. Some shifted, following my movement, much like the fantastical drawings from one of my favorite stories of a boy wizard. An unseen wind riffled through the paper layers, revealing older images—a flash of the indistinct figure serving as my imaginary savior—but before it came into focus, the nightmarish images fluttered back into place, hiding it.
No door broke the stone-and-paper-covered walls. Other than an occasional visit from the figment of my damaged mind and fractured hope, I was the sole occupant. It took five steps to cross the room. I knew because I’d counted. Hazy light filtered through a narrow window high above me and forever out of reach.
Warm wetness touched my sore, swollen lips. Unlocking my arms, I raised a shaking hand to brush it away. Bright-red smears stained my dirt-encrusted fingertips. Another nosebleed. I wiped my fingers against my dusty, dirty pants, adding another crimson mark to the fabric.
Concentrating on sucking air in and letting it out, I tried to make my mind blank, waiting to see if the monster who’d been playing with me for what seemed like forever would come back for another round. I was met with silence. Instead of easing my tension, this sent dread crawling under my skin, leaving me chilled. Imagination was a dangerous thing when fueled by fear, and I had no shortage of that.
A harsh, bitter laugh sliced through the unsettling quiet, leaving me on edge. It took a second for me to realize that the horrible sound was coming from me. I stuffed my scraped fist against my mouth, choking back my rising screams. My body shook as the last piece of me shattered into unrecognizable pieces—such an ironic end, considering how often I’d been accused of living in my mind. Now that I really was living in my mind, all I wanted was to get off the damn stage.
A muted roll of thunder drifted from the window above. Dust rained down, and my prison shook for the first time in… ever. Scrambling to my feet, I tried to figure out what was happening. Considering that this was a mental construct built deep in my own subconscious, this disruption was unexpected and unusual. Maybe it was a reflection of my mental collapse.
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Megan Rouser survived six months at the hands of a brutal telepath only to emerge with fractured memories and a terrifying premonition of impending danger. Determined to regain control of her life, she turns to the one man who held her together and brought her out of hell…Bishop.
But who’ll protect him from her…
Jacob Archer, aka Bishop, has spent his life protecting others, and as part of the off-the-books psychic ex-military team known as PSY-IV, it’s a skill he’s mastered. Rescuing the determined and intriguing Megan triggers all his white knight tendencies, despite lingering suspicions about her kidnapping. But what happens when the threat he should be watching for, is her?
As Megan and Bishop delve deeper into the twisted mind of a madman, will they find a way to survive unseen threats or be torn apart by the most intimate of betrayals?
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