Sanctuary Bay (28 page)

Sarah jumped, realizing that she hadn't moved away from him. For one brief but charged moment, she stayed pressed against him, his body warm. She knew she had to step away, but somehow couldn't force herself to do it.

He's Karina's boyfriend,
she thought, and that got her feet to move.

“Diaz is still futzing around in his office. If we're quiet, when he comes out he'll think we both left,” Ethan told her. “I want to see what the files say about Izzy's so-called treatment. I don't care what the dean says, it was like something out of a horror movie.” He pulled open one of the file drawers. “Do you think we convinced the dean we're going to be model students from now on?”

“I hope so,” Sarah answered, checking a drawer, then closing it. “When I had my first meeting with her—and that wasn't even two months ago—I never would have thought I'd be lying to her. All I wanted to do was impress her. But now I've turned into you, all paranoid and mistrustful.”

“Which is why I'm a good influence on you,” Ethan said with a little smile. “Although you've always been mistrustful—just not of the school. You never trusted me.”

Sarah hadn't realized Ethan knew. “It wasn't just you. I didn't trust anyone here, not until I joined the Wolfpack.” But after Karina, she'd gone straight to Dr. Diaz and ratted them out, so maybe she didn't really trust the Wolfpack, either. “Not trusting anyone is pretty much how I've survived,” she said quietly. “I was trying to change that here, to let go of all my old crap.”

“Doesn't sound like crap to me,” he replied. “But after what we just saw, anyone would be,
should
be mistrustful here. Gotta say, I'm not surprised Sanctuary Bay finds a violent medical treatment acceptable. Along with denying students access to help from outside. Oh, and disappearing them.”

“
I'm
surprised,” Sarah said. But after what she'd seen happening to Izzy, she found it a lot more believable that Philip didn't drown.

“What was that thing going into the back of Izzy's head?” Ethan asked. “Farrell said pulling it out might've caused brain damage, but she might've just said that to scare us.”

“I have no idea. And why does she even need a medical port? It's not like Izzy has cancer,” Sarah said. “Do you think it's a coincidence that right when Izzy's acting crazy and forgetting about shooting her roommate, the school is pumping drugs into her head?”

“She's been in therapy ever since she got here, though. The memory issue is new,” Ethan pointed out. “And your entire
precious
Wolfpack also has a convenient memory lapse about Karina. They're not all in therapy.”

Sarah sighed. “True. It's just that one of the meds they had going in to her was Bromcyan. As part of my Wolfpack initiation, I was thrown into one of the POW cells under the school. The word “Bromcyan” was carved into the walls over and over. I had no idea what it was, then I saw a bottle of it when we were in the asylum.”

“And you decided not to mention it?” Ethan burst out. “What the fuck, Sarah!?”

“I know, I know,” Sarah said quickly. “See? Trust issues. I hadn't told you yet that I was in the Wolfpack. And it didn't seem important anyway, just weird, until I saw it on that computer monitor attached to Izzy.”

Ethan turned back to the file cabinets. “We really need her file. And I want to look for Philip's. And while we're at it, why not Karina's. Yours too.”

Mine?

“Don't you wonder, Sarah?” he asked. “You're the only one who remembers what happened. Your memory is resisting whatever they've done to the rest of the Wolfpack.”

“But you just said yourself that the whole Wolfpack isn't in therapy,” Sarah said.

“Yeah, I know…” He sighed, frustrated. “I'm just trying to think it through.”

Sarah frowned. “Dr. Diaz said Izzy wouldn't remember her therapy. He said it looks scary but that the patient doesn't remember it. You don't think…” Her words trailed off.

No, that's too insane.

“That the school is using the treatment on other people to erase their memories?” Ethan suggested.

“But, it … it sounds crazy,” Sarah said.

Ethan didn't answer. He was staring at an open file. “I can't find Philip. And my own file is empty except for the time I broke my arm. I'm going to grab Karina's.”

“If you're at the ‘S' files, Izzy's should be near there. She's a ‘T.'” Sarah moved over to his side and stood on tiptoe, scanning the letter stickers on each file folder. Ethan put his hand on the small of her back, helping her balance.

She swallowed, forcing herself to ignore the little zing of electricity his touch gave her, trying to focus on finding the file quickly so she could move.

“Izzy's isn't here,” Sarah said. “I guess they must have it with her in the infirmary.”

“I don't see Karina's either,” he replied. Just the sound of him saying Karina's name was enough to make that electric tingle evaporate. She shook off his hand a little faster than she meant to, and Ethan's eyebrows shot up.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

The door flew open before Sarah could answer. Dr. Diaz stood there, glaring at them.

“Crap!” Ethan cried, wrapping his arms around Sarah's waist. He kicked the door closed. “We're not, uh, entirely dressed.”

Dr. Diaz pushed it open again.

“Don't you knock, man?” Ethan complained.

Sarah was too stunned to move. Dr. Diaz rolled his eyes. “Do you think I'm an idiot? Sarah's got better taste than to make out in a closet with you, Mr. Steere.”

Sarah squirmed out of Ethan's arms. “Are you going to take us back to the dean?”

“No, although I don't approve of you going through private medical records,” he answered. “Are you looking for Izzy's?”

They nodded.

“Listen, I owe you guys an apology. What I said about Izzy in the dean's office—I don't quite know if it's true.”

“What?” Ethan exploded.

“I wanted to get you two out of there, so I tried to sound knowledgeable about Izzy's treatment, hoping the dean didn't know more about it than I did,” Dr. Diaz said. “I've never been given actual details about the procedure.”

“What do you mean? You're the doctor,” Ethan said.

“Not for the treatment,” Sarah reminded him. “That woman who came in was the doctor in charge, right?”

“Exactly. I'm just here to give out antibiotics and pump stomachs,” Dr. Diaz said. “For anything else, the school brings in specialists.”

“But still, you're the one in charge of Izzy's health,” Ethan pressed. “You knew she was getting some crazy experimental therapy.”

“Yes, but I don't administer it. Nor do I know any of the specifics,” Dr. Diaz insisted. “It's not under the control of Sanctuary Bay. It's a Fortitude project.”

Sarah shot Ethan a questioning look. He shrugged.

“There wouldn't be anything about Izzy's treatment in these files, anyway—Fortitude keeps their own,” Dr. Diaz said.

“What about my brother?” Ethan asked suddenly. “Why aren't Philip's files here?”

“When students graduate, we put their files in storage.” Dr. Diaz's forehead creased as he thought about it. “I'll take you. Follow me.”

He took off so quickly that Sarah had to jog to catch up with him. They went out through the empty waiting room and down the hall to the closest stairwell. At the bottom were two doors—one leading outside and one that was marked
FACULTY ONLY
. Dr. Diaz pressed his finger against the keypad to the faculty door and it clicked open.

The stairwell heading to the basement wasn't nearly as well lit as the one above. Instead of marble, the steps were made of cement. At the bottom of the stairs was a short, nondescript hallway with three doors along the sides. Diaz went over to the second one on the right and opened it.

“More unlocked doors,” Ethan murmured in Sarah's ear as they followed.

“Well, the whole stairwell is locked,” she pointed out.

“It's a mess,” Dr. Diaz told them, gesturing around the room. It was surprisingly large, with stacks of boxes and about twenty big, old-fashioned wooden filing cabinets. “Generally, the newer files are in the boxes, but every few years I make an attempt at organizing things alphabetically instead, because that's how the ones in the file cabinets are. So then I end up shoving newer files in with the older ones and vice versa. I should probably stop doing that.”

Ethan went over to the closest box and began digging through it. Sarah turned to Dr. Diaz. “What's Fortitude?”

“It's a company, the Fortitude Corporation. They're a private contractor.”

“What does that mean?” she asked.

“It means they developed a treatment for PTSD and other mental disorders, and they're in the testing phase. They partnered with Sanctuary Bay to do the trials,” Dr. Diaz replied. “Or, rather, Sanctuary Bay hired them to do the trials. The school gets a lot of mileage with wealthy parents because they offer cutting-edge solutions to psychological problems. We can't do the research and development ourselves, so the school looks for promising companies to do it for us. Then we partner with them for clinical trials.”

“But you're a scientist,” Sarah said. “Don't you want to be involved in any kind of—what is it, psychopharmacological?—experiment?”

“I do,” he agreed. “But that's not up to me. The Fortitude Corporation has its own protocols, and that doesn't include school doctors.”

“So, Dr. LaSalle, the woman Ethan and I saw, she works for Fortitude?” Sarah asked.

“I guess. I've never seen her, or the treatment room.” He sighed. “Honestly, I've never given it much thought. They operate so separately from us. But the way you described Izzy's therapy … it doesn't sound right.”

“You mean because she was strapped down like a victim on
Dexter
?” Ethan said with a snort.

“Yes, but it's more that. Sarah said there was a port in her neck. That's extremely odd. Usually that sort of thing would only be used for chemotherapy or something similar, and it wouldn't be in her neck.”

“How do you know she won't remember it? Or was that just something you said for the dean too?” Sarah asked.

“I'm positive. I found traces of midazolam in her blood work. Midazolam is a drug that's used to induce amnesia after medical procedures,” he replied.

“What about Bromcyan? Is that a drug that messes with memory?” Sarah asked. She quickly gave him the rundown on the three places she'd seen the name.

“Never heard of it,” Dr. Diaz answered. “But I can look into it.”

“So what do we do now?” Sarah asked. “If Karina's alive, then where is she? If that treatment is supposed to help Izzy, then why does it seem like she's suddenly lost her mind? And why is the entire Wolfpack acting insane? They repeated a meeting last night word for word and they didn't even realize it.”

“What the hell is this?” Ethan's voice was quiet, but something about his tone made Sarah nervous.

“Did you find Philip's file?” she asked.

“No,” he said. “But I found my father's.” He held up a thick brown file folder. “Gregory Steere. And there's another one right next to it. Elizabeth Lanning. Except somebody wrote in another last name after that, so it would be filed in the right place, I guess. Elizabeth Lanning
Steere
. My mother.”

Sarah's eyes widened. “I didn't know your parents went to Sanctuary Bay,” she said.

“That's the thing,” Ethan replied. “They didn't.”

 

15

“Let me see those,” Dr. Diaz said, reaching for the files in Ethan's hand. “Maybe they're just medical histories for enrollment purposes. We don't do that currently, but it's entirely possible there used to be a family history taken.”

“Yeah, especially if it has your mom's married name,” Sarah said.

“See for yourself.” Ethan handed the files over and turned away. From the look on Dr. Diaz's face, he wasn't looking at a simple medical history. His eyes moved back and forth, scanning the records, his forehead creased with concern.

“Ethan…” Sarah wasn't sure how to approach him.

“They met at Harvard,” he said without turning around. “Sophomore year. They have this whole story about it. She sat next to him in philosophy class and he immediately started annoying her by asking to borrow a pen. Every time she'd tell the story, she'd say the same thing: Who comes to a philosophy class without a pen? But that was all it took. Love at first sight and all that. At least that's what they always said.”

“Maybe they just meant that they started dating then, but they knew each other in high school,” Sarah suggested.

“They're my parents. I know when they met,” he snapped, looking at her.

“Okay, sorry,” Sarah said. She started back toward Dr. Diaz, but Ethan grabbed her hand.

“No, I shouldn't yell at you. Obviously I don't really know.” His expression was so sad that every fiber of her being wanted to draw him in for a hug. “I don't know anything about my family at all.”

“These records indicate that your parents spent all four years of high school here at the Academy,” Dr. Diaz said.

“That would explain why it seemed normal to them to send Philip here, if it was their high school,” Sarah said.

“There's nothing normal about any of this,” Ethan muttered.

“When did the school first open?” Sarah asked, looking around the big room. “There's a lot of stuff in here, and the classes aren't that big.”

“In the early fifties,” Dr. Diaz replied. “But you're right, there does seem to be a lot. I wonder if there's more than just medical records—it could be old student academic files, I suppose. I've actually never made it to the back of the room.”