Asylum ((Finished) Story) Part 2 -- (Author) dogboy

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Author: dogboy
Timestamp: Oct 27, 2020 at 6:27 PM
Content: Asylum (Finished Story) Part 2

dogboy


Moorehaven

The yellow school busses left the disused school for the once gifted, one bus following the other in an orderly scripted procession, much like a funeral procession as each occupant was slowly dying from the inside out, memories disappearing into a jumble of disconnected thoughts. The parents, those who had unwittingly given birth to the remarkable children, were the first to lose any insight as to who they once were. They hadn’t benefited from the intellectual effects of the green fluid. They were just the vessels and so their memories slipped away leaving intact only the infantile instincts of survival. Bus after bus was being serenaded by the wails of crying adult bodies, but now, voices that sounded more like toddlers. Worse yet, at least for the drivers, their busses were beginning to smell like a diaper pail. The lead bus sped up, the driver uncomfortable. The old sanatorium was still miles away.

Abigail searched her mind, what little was left of who she was; now wondering where she was. Where were her mommy and daddy? Why was she in a bus? Was this the first day of school, but she was too young for school. That would be two or three years from now. She wanted her mommy and so she cried, just like all the others on the bus.

Who was sitting next to her, she wondered. That wasn’t daddy but he seemed so familiar, like she had spent her whole life with him. She looked at him and he frightened her. There was so much fear in his eyes.

Bartholomew sat in the seat behind his parents, both he and Alicia, but he wasn’t able to comprehend that. What he did understand was that he had just wet his pants and all he could think was that mommy would come and change his diaper. He wanted his diaper changed and he wanted to be home and that’s when he realized something was terribly wrong. He remembered his home, his mother and father and he remembered living there, being a baby, then a toddler and what came next? Wasn’t it school? That’s where his memories left off and now he just wanted to be taken care of. That would come soon because the busses were turning off the road, slowing down and going up the long circular driveway only to approach a huge dark and forbidding building, the kind that towers over the land it occupies and looks down at any and all things that would have the temerity to approach it.

The once red bricks had darkened over the century where it stood, its interior even darker, but not as dark as its history. There were a thousand stories hidden within the institutional walls as this had been an asylum for the insane, for those who could not live in the real and normal world. This was a place built solely to hide away those who would be forgotten by society, forgotten by embarrassed or frightened families who could no longer protect a family member because the fragile exterior of living had been torn apart by the irrational. Some were wives or husbands who lost their way. Many were children who never found any normalcy and worse, never found love. There was only the screaming of voices inside disturbed minds, telling the respective recipients to do horrible things and when those deeds were acted upon, sometimes repeatedly, they would find themselves locked away forever at Moorehaven.

After the chemical spill and the discovery of the many varied properties of CE X, there was a drawing together of those who worshipped power as if by an invisible force; a force that demanded obedience. One of its acolytes was nurse Florence. Here finally was the opportunity to become something few people could obtain: something godlike. She had assembled a staff not just at Moorehaven, but for other aging and forgotten institutions throughout the country. Forgotten and unseen was the caveat as the forbearers for this brave new world would have to remain hidden for the time being until the monster that was CE X had devoured the world.

The staff had been carefully selected, the need for secrecy sealed on their lips. These too were the hidden, those who society had rejected. They were the desperate, those who were difficult or impossible to employ: the homeless and destitute, the ones with nothing to lose and everything to gain. Moorehaven would be a new start giving housing and shelter along with three meals a day. They would be the mommies and daddies for the human industrial waste products of CE X and what irony. The once successful and brilliant were now the discarded, soon to be the prisoners of a world that had left them behind, left them to being treated as babies and toddlers because that was what they had now become. At least, that is what The Institute believed. They had manipulated their brilliant prodigy into creating a new and lasting society, one finally at peace with the world where there was no war, no crime or violence. There also was no freedom of choice because The Institute supplied that as well.

Weeks earlier, Nurse Flora had the staff lined up, all nice and orderly and she was giving instructions. Everything was going to plan and as always, her demeanor demanded attention.

“Your patients will be arriving in three days and you will be their caretakers. They will seem like young children: infantile. Those of you who have maternal instincts may want to parent them, coddle them even, but don’t. These are adults and not children. They will seem like toddlers or babies and you may want to treat them as such but they deserve no such care. You will do the bare minimum, feeding them and changing their diapers. You’ve been instructed on this and you had better follow that to the letter or you may be joining them.”

Several of the caretakers looked at the person standing next to them. A few shifted on their feet. They knew what they were getting themselves into and it was easy to say yes when they needed a job, but now reality was creeping up on them. Though thoroughly instructed, they still didn’t know what to expect. And there was something else. They had been at Moorehaven for several weeks receiving their training during the day, but it was in the night that they felt the most uncomfortable.

Moorehaven was a big building with five floors and two wings. Though their rooms were in the center of the building, the Central wing, it was both the East Wing and West Wing that they found discomforting. There was the occasional banging, something falling over perhaps, but it was the voices that they couldn’t explain; the occasional man or woman’s voice heard late at night in the West Wing. Worse was the East Wing because it was there they heard the children. There was the solitary scream in the middle of night and more disturbing, a child crying. They were told it was the heating system and to ignore it, but they knew there was something else. They were forever glad that they were only using the central part of the building. That had contained consultation rooms and the business operation of what was once Moorehaven Asylum. Now, the business operation which included computers, servers, audio and video was housed in the basement. There was an all together different staff who ran that and the caretakers seldom saw them. It all was so clandestine.

The caretakers were not allowed in the basement, not that any of them would want to go down there. They all had their living quarters, a solitary room on one of the upper floors in the central building. Their rooms were bare of any amenities except for a small TV, a dorm refrigerator and a sink. They would have to use the restroom on their floor, toilet stalls and showers, but they were used to that, most of them having spent time in public housing. They were the hardened, abused as children and soon out on their own. They were the scarred, the ruined with little ability to love. That had been denied them their entire lives. They were chosen for that reason, the perfect match for Moorehaven. Nurse Florence didn’t want the caretakers to attach to their special clientele. She saw it as a weakness. Caring was a weakness. Her plan would have worked almost anywhere, but Moorehaven had other occupants with other ideas and it was in the night that they stirred.

The caretakers talked among themselves, especially in the morning on their way to the cafeteria because it was in the morning when the memories of their dreams were most present. Mary was the most forthcoming, telling her dreams to almost anyone who would listen. Most weren’t interested or didn’t want to listen because they were dealing with their dreams and those dreams were disturbing. The fact that they all were having the same dream made it worse. How was that possible, they wondered? They were told it was just the building and what it once was. The power of suggestion is strong. Again they were told by the managing staff, how to behave and what it is to be professional though the executive staff lived on the first floor and had rooms that looked like nice apartments. Everything changed on the second floor and the floors above. The caretakers were well aware that their accommodations wouldn’t be much different from their clientele and they talked about that among themselves as well.

They Arrive

Moorehaven had an alarm system. It was old and antiquated, a bell system on each floor operated from the administration office on the first floor and right now it was going off, a metal bell being hammered by a striker, each bell on each floor sounding a deafening alarm that the busses were pulling up to the double front doors. Moorehaven was soon to be in operation once again after all the years of silence. This is what the caretakers had trained for and they were running down the many flights of stairs to finally encounter something that had scared them from the first day of training: adult babies. Even though their training had been detailed and thorough, each one concealed the same thought. What do you do with a crying adult baby, because crying they would be and then what?

The managing staff joined the caretakers, both hurrying to meet the busses, clipboards in hand and names and room numbers neatly printed on sheets of paper attached to the clipboards. That was the easy part because the clientele, those reduced in mind and memory were confused and frightened. They wanted to go home but they couldn’t remember where or what home was, and so they cried and wailed, unwilling to move from their seats.

Each caretaker was directed to a bus, the steel entombment that carried those who had been the first of an extraordinary experiment and now were unceremoniously abandoned by the very people who had created them. At first, the caretakers relied on their training, speaking authoritatively to what were to be called, the children. All that did was cause more confusion and anxiety. The caretakers voices raised, anger heightening the anxiety of the adult children.

The caretakers didn’t know what to do until it was Mary who shouted, “Be quiet,” and then she spoke to her client, “It’s Bartholomew, isn’t it? It’s okay baby. Everything will be fine baby, just wonderful and safe. Can you stand up and walk?”

She didn’t know what to expect. All the caretakers had been told that their clientele were capable of walking, but at the moment, no one was sure. Bartholomew searched his mind. He knew what walk meant but the word was fuzzy, buried somewhere deep in his lost memories. Something came forward through the fog; the word walk and he suddenly knew what that was. He stood up and moved toward the front of the bus. Walking was difficult as he toddled forward, having to think about each step.

The others looked at Bartholomew, their fear being redirected to something different, now standing and following. A caretaker called to a staff member suggesting that the other bus caretakers talk to their clients in a motherly way to what were now essentially toddlers. It wasn’t perfect, but the adult sized babies were taken to their rooms, one toddling behind another, each directed to their assigned room, four toddlers assigned to a caretaker, floors two through five coming to life after so many years of dormancy and neglect. Had Nurse Florence been there, she would have laughed as each adult toddler struggled to negotiate the many steps leading upward to the awaiting rooms but she would have been furious in the way it was accomplished.

Mary looked at her clipboard. She was assigned Bartholomew and his wife Alicia as well as his parents who were down the hall in the next room. She worked with a male caretaker, Mert, who was assigned Bart along with his wife. Bart’s parents were in the following room, one more room down the hall and further into the darkness.

There were two single beds in each room and a night table between the two beds and on that night table was the ubiquitous virtual assistant complete with microphone, speaker and an assortment of colored lights which shone like a miniature lighthouse.

Mary helped her clients into their new home and announced to the virtual assistant, “Lights on” and a floor lamp turned on revealing something that had been part of the preparations to welcome the newcomers. The lightshade was decorated with a childish print of circus animals. There were a few hanging pictures on the walls, pictures of baby animals which seemed fitting as there were also other baby items in the room, items however that were adult sized such as a diaper changing table and piles of diapers neatly stacked on an old mahogany bureau. Mary wasn’t sure if she would be able to get either Bartholomew or his wife to the changing table and so decided to change them out of their wet clothes while they were standing. It wasn’t hard for her to see the confusion in their faces and she thought she could take advantage of their motionless demeanor. Teaching them some basic skills would come tomorrow. Now she had to get them diapered and into their baby clothes, onsies with the reoccurring cute baby animals prints. She was a little uncomfortable disrobing them but her new wards didn’t seem to mind or if they did, they were incapable of showing it which was fine by her. She just needed to get this done.

She guided Bartholomew over to the bed and motioned him to lie down. She took a diaper from the stack and got him to role to the one side. Once the diaper was under him it was relatively easy to lift his legs up and pull the one end of the diaper toward his waist. The caretakers had trained for several weeks and Mary felt relieved when she had Bartholomew diapered. Getting his onesie on was harder but with some instruction, he cooperated and the task was finished.

“I’m going to have to find an easier name for you my little baby. Bartholomew is a big boy’s name. How would you like baby Barty,” she asked?

Bartholomew searched his mind and for some odd reason, baby Barty seemed very nice; comforting even.

Mary turned her attention to Alicia and got her settled into her bed.

“How’s that, baby Alicia,” she asked? “Isn’t this a cute little baby diaper? See all the cute little baby animals printed on your diaper?”

Alicia was swept by the same feelings as her husband, one of acceptance and peace. “I baby,” she thought and closed her eyes. It had been a long day. That she had been in the old school cafeteria a few hours ago never crossed her mind and as she and her once husband drifted to sleep, the virtual assistant was dimming the lights and playing infant lullabies, but it was also playing something else, something running backwards and sideways, something to convince anyone who would listen that they were a baby. The same was happening in every room on floors two through five. The caretakers were unaware that this was happening, but they were retreating to their rooms where their virtual assistants were playing something else.

All was at rest in Moorehaven, each personal assistant softly playing the same set list of children’s lullabies, each song reinforcing the security of care giving, each baby held safe in lullaby and each lullaby singing its sad song, “Hush little baby don’t you cry. Daddy’s going to find you a mocking bird.” But hidden in that song were other lyrics.

“Mommy’s going to keep you safe and sound and when the morning comes around, a baby you will forever be, not to run or be set free, but here in Moorehaven you will be. Wearing diapers you’ll enjoy, whether girl or boy it will not matter for baby thoughts and childish patter is what you are.”

Bartholomew’s eyes opened and for a moment he felt fear. Where was he, he wondered? He heard the soft music, something to lull him to sleep, but he didn’t feel sleepy. Something interrupted that, first in a dream and now? It was a voice: a child’s voice. But baby Barty was a child, wasn’t he? He thought so. Who was this in the room with him?

“Wake up,” it said. “Wake up Barty.”

It knew his name.

“Don’t listen to it Barty. Fight it,” it said, and then it faded into the night, again to be replaced by the constant music of the virtual assistant, assisting each and everyone in listening distance. It played lullabies but what it said was, listen and obey. You are a baby, and that played on all the floors, two through five.

The caretakers were being serenaded as well, though theirs said, “babies need to be disciplined. Good caretakers are stern teachers,” and this would have sufficed, nurse Florence’s instructions carried out except for the East Wing.

Life as a Baby

They had fallen into a routine, both the adult babies and their caretakers. Every morning it was the same, caretakers first taking care of themselves, early morning showers and then getting dressed. But there wasn’t much time where they could dote on themselves because their charges were being awoken by the virtual assistants, electronic devices saying, “Time to wake up little one. Time for baby to wakie and have a diaper change. You love your diapers little baby and soon you will be fed. Time to feed the baby,” it repeated. “You’re a sweet little baby” and with that Barty opened his eyes and screamed.

Mary had been running late, wanting to just be able to sleep and escape whatever was coming because she had another bad dream and something was coming, or had someone come into her room? She was confused but there was no time for that now because one of her charges had just screamed. No one was supposed to do that. At least that was what they were all told in their training. She ran into Bartholomew and Alicia’s room and that’s when she realized she was only half dressed but it wouldn’t matter. Babies couldn’t care less.

“What’s the matter baby? Did baby have a bad dream? That’s okay little one, mommy’s here.” Had Nurse Florence heard this she would have a special remedy for a disobedient caregiver but it was just Mary and her special children. Mary had lived a life with little love so she was surprised when Barty grabbed her and pulled her into him, hugging her like she was his mother.

“It’s okay baby. Let’s get you and Alicia changed and dressed. Everything’s fine now,” but in her heart she knew that wasn’t true because she had “the dream”. That’s what the caretakers called it now even though it was a series of dreams that were always the same. The others were coming, and they would take them into the room where they would be diapered and left for hours only to be taken down into the basement where the room of darkness waited. Those dreams were amorphous, but they were beginning to take shape and substance with each passing day, a little more detail and a lot more dread upon waking. And there was something else, something more disturbing because the dreams were slowly becoming part of their day thoughts. At first Mary thought she was daydreaming and she could shake them out of her head, but that was becoming more difficult. She was on a gurney and someone was pushing her. Where they orderlies, she wondered? She thought it was two men dressed in green and then she was suddenly back in the room with Barty and Alicia. Alicia was calling her. “Momma,” she heard and when she turned her head, Alicia had her hands stretched out toward her.

“Mommy,” she heard Alicia say and Mary wondered; where had she been?

Mary coaxed Barty out of bed and took him by the hand. From there she led him down the hall to the large shower room. They had been working together, Mary teaching little Barty how to clean himself. She did this with her other three wards. Barty’s parents, Abigail and Tad were more difficult, slower to learn as their brains had been more thoroughly wiped, but they were slowly catching on. Mary was pleased with herself. After the showers she got them all back in their rooms, diapered and dressed in their clothes which would serve them for all their days at Moorehaven. She thought they looked so cute in their rompers, and the diaper bulges seemed to tell the story. They had been changed into little toddlers.

She addressed Barty and Alicia, now back in their room. She had discovered that being a kind and loving parent worked so much better than acting as she had been trained: cold and callous.

“Okay my sweet and loving babies. It’s time to get our breakfast yum yums. Do my sweet babies want their breakfast?”

“Yeth bweckfast,” Barty replied.

Mary had encouraged all of her little ones to use their words and she was so pleased with herself. She finally was helping others. She had meaning in her life, something that was new to her. She gathered her four little ones and led them down the steps to the cafeteria. Her charges were getting easier and easier to handle. Teaching them had many rewards. She felt good as they left Barty and Alicia’s room; so good that she didn’t notice that the lights on top of the virtual assistant were revolving around and around: faster and faster in the growing darkness. Lights were blinking on the basement servers, everything being documented. The basement was one hub of many hubs, stretching across continents. The world was changing.

Yum-Yums

The cafeteria was on the main floor of the West Wing, and it was the only part of that building that had been restored to its original self. Beyond the cafeteria were stairways that led to the upper rooms, floors two through five. Below was another basement and that was a place no one wanted to explore.

The cafeteria was pleasant, painted an institutional cream color, and there were pictures of baby animals painstakingly stenciled on the walls. The light fixtures revealed its age however, opaque globes casting light that was partially diffused as if it was intentionally holding back warmth. The children didn’t seem to mind or maybe they were incapable of noticing because gathering together always brought with it childish excitement.

Mary led her small group to their assigned table. She and the other caregivers would have to get the food trays because the children were not capable of doing that for themselves, but Mary was going to change that too. Many of the caretakers were doing similar things. Observing Mary’s success made one thing apparent: less work for them. There were the exceptions however.

“Come on! Get in here and don’t give me any trouble.” It was Mert and he was in a foul mood.

“Sit down, damn it.”

Barty looked up just as he had every day because this happened on a regular basis just as everything repeated itself day after day. But it was on this day that he realized there was something different. He saw the fear in their eyes, not just strangers’ eyes but Bart, his wife and his parents Betty and Nelson. Barty would have searched his mind more thoroughly but Mary placed his tray in front of him: eggs, toast and sausage and when she held his spoon and said, “Here baby. Let’s eat our yummy breakfast,” he was little Barty again. He thought how he loved being a baby and he took a bite so willingly, enjoying every mouthful being fed to him.

With breakfast over, the children had to be carefully cleaned up, their mouths and chins wiped and hands cleaned. Bibs needed to be wiped down and put away, and then the children were led out of the cafeteria, down the connecting hall and into the East Wing where there was a large room, again on the first floor. The room had been restored by the construction crew into a playroom. There were toys, blocks, dolls and riding horses that bounced up and down. The children were happy to play with the toys the first few weeks but as the weeks passed and as they were learning new skills from their caregivers, they began to lose interest and there was something else, something that toddlers and caregivers felt. They were not alone.

The laughter or crying from the toddlers were the sounds an adult would make, even if the pitches had risen to accommodate their infantile condition but there were other sounds that would often be heard in the east building and that was of children: real children with real children’s’ voices. Those voices were infrequent but when they made themselves known, it was unsettling. Occasionally it was a laughing child as if he or she was in the playroom with them but there was something else, other voices that came from somewhere else in the building, perhaps on another floor above them, but no one was going to go beyond the playroom because the rest of the East Wing looked just as it did when Moorehaven was abandoned decades ago.

The caregivers tried not to pay attention to the voices but they had a good idea who and what they were because they were also in their dreams. They told themselves that dreams couldn’t hurt them, that the voices weren’t real but there was something else they couldn’t ignore because it was so horrible, and those voices came from below, from the disused basement. Those voices were also in their dreams, not at first, not the first few weeks when they were training, but now that the adult babies were here, so was this new presence and it couldn’t be ignored. No young child screaming for mercy could ever be ignored, and it was the “please no, no, no, not that. I promise I’ll be good. No please don’t hurt me…..” that had every caregiver on edge.

Bartholomew heard it just as every adult baby heard it. At first it was just unsettling, making them anxious, but now…..now that they were learning, there were new feelings.

Bad Dreams

The staff and caregivers were the first to have them because they were the first to inhabit Moorehaven in more than sixty years. The construction crew complained about the voices. They accused one another of misplacing tools but after the first few days, they knew something else was occurring. They were relieved when their job was finished and they were especially glad they would never set foot in Moorehaven again. The staff was not as lucky and though they were told little about what went on at Moorehaven, they had their suspicions because there were the dreams.

Every night the others would come. They would come from the many rooms, some as orderlies but most as patients. It was hard to tell which were more disturbing. In the beginning they were just wisps, fragments of thoughts and ideas: past remembrances but night after night those remnants began to take on shape and form: orderlies dressed in green medical uniforms, green sleeved arms reaching outward, clawing, clutching and dragging each sleeper somewhere into the dark recesses of Moorehaven. Each dreaming sleeper was disappearing deeper and deeper into each succeeding night, falling deeper and deeper into what waited for them in the basement and after the orderlies were done with them, they had been reduced to mindlessness. The electrostatic crackling of the machines in the basement had seen to that and now they were being wheeled on a gurney into another room and this one was terrifying because it was here they were being diapered. After the machine they would have no control and so they would be diapered and they wouldn’t care.

Mary woke with a gasp. “What the fuck!” she would yell just as she had every morning, and like every morning, she would have to tell herself it was just a dream.

The same was happening to the other councilors and staff members. Something different was happening to the adult children because in their dreams they were someone else.

Barty was in the East Wing. He had been there for several years along with many of the others. He lived on the boys level, 5th floor only he didn’t think he was Barty. He was Bobby and he was dressed like a baby, wearing a onesie and a diaper. All the children were. He bit down on his pacifier because he was nervous. He was always nervous. His parents had called it psychosis especially after he tried to set the house on fire. He hated them and now more than ever for sending him to this place with all the other crazy kids. He wanted to be home with his friends, running the streets and getting into the occasional scrape, but stealing wasn’t that bad until you got caught. Beating up another kid wasn’t bad because he had it coming to him. That’s what he told himself late at night upstairs in his room, holding himself tight and crying.

Bobby tried to behave but what he really wanted was just to be with his friends and left alone. He wanted to be good but he had trouble doing that because the world was confusing. It scared him, making demands that frightened him so he got angry. Sometimes you just had to hit back, break something, and sometimes, break yourself. His parents sent him to Moorehaven and hoped they’d never see him again. They got their wish.

Moorehaven knew how to make the children behave. Humiliation was such a wonderful technique and what better way than to make a tough boy become a toddler. When Bobby was first admitted and told what he would become, how he would enjoy being a little diaper wearing baby, he went to his room, shut the door and cried for hours. Exhaustion consumed him and when he finally stopped he saw his room clearly, four walls, a bed, chair, chest of drawers and nothing else. There would be little to do but realize what you were becoming because there would be more: so much more and that would happen the very next day.

Barty was with the other boys in the playroom. They were allowed some playtime but the only things in that room were baby toys. Barty wasn’t interested in stacking blocks or anything else there, but he was shocked to see how many of his peers were doing just that, playing with toys, acting like toddlers as if this was normal. Perhaps he wouldn’t have questioned this because back in his room, the virtual assistant was softly reciting a similar scene.

“You are a sweet baby. You love to play with your baby toys. You love to have momma feed you and change your diaper. You are a baby.” Every resident was hearing this night after night but Barty had a visitor and Bobby was trying to get his attention.

Some of the older residents were given small jobs to perform but Bobby was asked to accompany one of the orderlies and he had something different planned for the boy.

Barty was again restless, turning in his sleep, somehow aware that he was accompanying the orderly down the stairs and heading to the basement. There was a doctor waiting for him along with a metal try, syringe and a machine. When it was over, Bobby was wheeled into an old elevator which took him back to his room. Bobby felt at ease wetting his diaper as if this was the way everything should be. He was little again and easy to control. Yes, he would do whatever he was told. The alternative was so much worse.

Barty woke up with a start, feeling panic and trying not to cry out but he did just that when he felt a pale hand on his arm and saw the boy who was standing next to his bed.

“Shhhh,” it said. “I have something to show you.”

Barty was again startled when he realized that he could see through the boy and suddenly all of his confusion began to clear. He wasn’t Bobby but he felt that he had been, had been used and manipulated, forced to believe he was a baby so that he could be controlled. It all started to make sense. People could be manipulated in so many different ways and then he remembered that he had been part of this and yes, he too had been manipulated.

“Come with me Barty, please.”

Barty looked into his face and knew who this was, the Bobby of his dreams and then he saw something else: sadness. The small room took on an atmosphere as if a fog had filled every corner with something that could be only felt as sorrow. This feeling was so strong and overwhelming that Barty knew he would let Bobby take him to wherever it was just so he might find some peace, something that had been a stranger to all the inhabitants of Moorehaven.

The diapered pair would have made an interesting site to an observer had anyone been up at three in the morning, but the rest of the building slept and dreamed their repetitive dreams. Those dreams created in the void of death paralleled those who now walked in the night, one living and one passed, the dead holding the hand of the living, leading him down the dark hall and to a wall except that where the hall seemed to end, it continued as a concealed door opened revealing a continuation of disused rooms, dirty and rusting and then another door, entering the East Wing and the old elevator that led down into an ancient part of the basement, something undiscovered by the construction crew and the current staff.

There was no light down here below the first floor but it mattered little because Barty was seeing through Bobby’s eyes. Together they entered the rooms that contained the electro shock machines and the odd assortments of vials and syringes which would hold the mind altering drugs all designed to control and destroy a child’s sense of self.

“I lost myself here,” was all Bobby said and as they looked on, a line of children passed through the halls led by orderlies. The smell of ozone and fear filled the rooms. “Did this happen every night?” Barty wondered.

“One last thing,” as Bobby gently pulled Barty’s hand and led him back down the hall and through another hidden door, and when that door opened, Barty saw something very familiar: a modern display of computers and screens, all the things he had once used when he was Bartholomew. They were back in the central basement.

“There’s one more thing I have to do and then you have to do it for the others,” and with that, Bobby led Barty up the Central building stairs to his room. The virtual assistant was spinning its tail of baby dreams until Bobby pointed his finger at the devise. So much electrical energy had been arcing through Moorehaven, both in the past and the present and now one more crack hit the personal assistant taking out the speaker.

“Save them,” and with that, Bobby faded away.

Barty assured himself that he was back in his room but now he realized, it wasn’t really his room and he hugged himself and softly cried, if not for himself, then for Bobby.

The morning came and the caregivers seemed to all be in their collective bad moods because the night had not been kind. The dreams were getting worse: more intense. Though their memories were foggy, imprecise, there were the feelings from those dreams that were left behind and those were strongly intact and there was more. Their dreams were connected to their strange clientele, adults who should be adults but weren’t. Where was the separation between the two they wondered because at night, they were being taken from their beds and dragged downward into the dark where the walls were close and oppressive and there was something that always remained unanswered, unresolved. What comes next? They were afraid to speculate because that answer was waiting for them each morning.