18. - Barricades

Since we didn't get to talk about Zhan's father last night because I wasn't feeling well, Zhan offered to talk about him, after I asked him again what kind of person his father was and why he said he wished he could apologize to his father for not turning out the way his father wanted him to.

Everyone else is just resting since we just had lunch. So Zhan and I went to our room, sat down on our bed, we also have a table and two chairs there now, which we got from the visiting room, and Zhan then started to tell me the story between him and his father.

"You know, it seems like my parents switched roles the day I was born. My dad always wanted to be a father, in fact it was his greatest wish. Then when I was born, he took care of me day and night and even my mom had trouble getting to me. My dad always let me sleep on his chest, held me in his arms the whole night and that, until the birth of my sister, two years later. And even then he was still totally crazy about me. - My sister was the absolute mommy child. Although my dad also adored my sister, he usually took more care of me. I don't know why, it was just always like that. I was with my dad, my sister was with my mom. - No matter how many years passed, I was and am his baby ZhanZhan for my dad. He always clung to me very much, but since my sister's death, even more so. - His greatest wish for me was always that I myself would one day find a loving and beautiful wife and then start my own family with her, to see how great it is to be a father. He had always talked about it since I was three years old. - However, I realized as a teenager that I was different. But because I was always afraid of hurting my father if I told him I might never have a wife, I kept my secret - Then when my sister died, it had gotten worse, he clung even more and talked almost every day about how much he was looking forward to being a grandfather someday. - Well, my sister had just died, and I couldn't take that pressure anymore and it burst out of me. I told him I would never have a wife because I wasn't into women. My dad didn't look at me, he just got up and went into his hobby room. My mom just said that it didn't matter, then it wouldn't be a wife, it would be a husband. For four or five days my dad didn't talk to me, then he came into my room, sat down with me and said, no matter who you marry, I will always love you and you will always be my baby ZhanZhan. I will never stop loving you and you will always be the best thing that happened to me. And even though he said that, he had this sad look in his eyes and I knew I destroyed his dream. Even though it's not my fault, I'm sorry I didn't turn out the way he always wanted me to. My dad deserved it, believe me."

I listened to Zhan and saw the love for his father in his eyes. I also have a good relationship with my father, as well as with my mother. But I think the relationship between father and son with Zhan and his dad must be very special or particular. I'm sure we'll talk a lot more about his dad someday, but for now, it's perfectly enough for me to understand why Zhan had said that.

Now I wish even more, I had at least a little bit of signal on my cell phone, then we could call all of our families and talk to them. Maybe "they" will allow us to call our families so we can tell them we are ok.

*~*~*

After our talk, Zhan and I also slept for a little while. There's not much else we can do right now anyway. Walking around the corridors, talking, eating and sleeping. That's all.

We also took our medication for the first time earlier. André said it was better to take them voluntarily before they really find a way to force us to. And it would also be in our best interest to stay healthy in case there really is some kind of pathogen in the cave.

We also just talked about how we are going to deal with Station 2 now. Since they feel threatened by us and they have already put something in our food once, we should come up with something to keep them away from us. At the moment we have protected the door to our station with a barricade, because among the many keys, unfortunately there was none for the door. But that doesn't work for the elevators. Especially not now that we receive our deliveries via them.

Also, each of us has a room key, so we can lock ourselves in when we sleep. Our groceries are one station below us and we found keys there too and locked the little kitchen so that our crazy people up there, can't get to our groceries to poison them.

Meng Yao suggested that every night before we go to sleep, we now also barricade the elevator doors. Just to be on the safe side.

I don't know why we, being more people than they are, are so afraid. Maybe it's because they seem to have gone crazy somehow. And crazy people can be trusted with anything, can't they?

But if this continues, then we will soon be just as crazy as the others. Because if Meng Yao, Leni and Missy have their way, we should also secure the door to station two and barricade it so that they can't get out. They will still have the elevator, but they want to come up with something for that.

André advised everyone to stay calm and act level-headedly. He said that we should talk to the people in charge of this institute so that they can come up with something to protect us.

Meng Yao then laughed and said, "Who says they really just want to help us? We could already be participating in a psychic experiment, unknowingly. That's what this facility was created for, isn't it?"

André didn't have an answer to that either. Because we all took another look at all these files and documents. They are full of evaluations of psychological tests. We even read something about hypnosis. Unfortunately, we hardly understand any of the technical jargon and mostly stuck to the written notes of the nurses.

At the moment, most of them listen very carefully when Meng Yao says something. Even if he brings it across wrong, but his theories don't sound quite as stupid as we're used to hearing from him.

A nurse wrote something about an experiment with hypnosis. The patients were very good friends. After hypnosis they did not recognize each other, but thought they had an enemy in each other. The experiment ended when one patient slit the throat of the other who was once his best friend.

And we even found something to our Nazis. Unfortunately, we only understand that they were not Nazis at all. But under hypnosis they were told they were the last surviving Nazis and on the run and that their only chance to survive was the cave. Unfortunately, we could not translate more of this into a version we could understand.

*~*~*

Zhan and I have noticed that almost everyone in our group is talking only about our protection here in this institute and not about how we can best get out of here.

Just now at dinner, Leni and Missy were talking about looking again for the remote control for the TV in the visitors' room. Because they found another DVD player and a couple of DVDs in the supply room by the registration desk. The others were immediately in favor and joined the two.

When I asked my brother what about our plans to get out of here as soon as possible, he said, "As long as Han and Leni can't walk properly, we'll stay here anyway, and no one says we can't make ourselves a little comfortable during that time. You and Zhan have furnished your room, too, haven't you?"

I wouldn't call it furnished. We just added a table and two chairs so that we can sit there. I can write better while sitting at the table. Yes, and we made our bed. So we unscrewed the upper bed, we loosened the screws with a knife, put it next to our bed and fixed it there. Also, we cleared out the unnecessary beds and moved them into an unused room, but the others did that too.

"But the others are also already talking about maybe moving down a floor so we don't have to always go downstairs or drive to get food or cook. And they want to see if there's a sofa somewhere or armchairs and create a cozy TV room. That's what they make plans for. But not for how the best thing for us to do when "they" get here to investigate us or how to get out of here." I finally replied.

My brother looked at me thoughtfully and then said quietly, "I know what you mean and I've noticed that too. But, I think after all we've been through so far, they're just looking for and needing some normalcy and distraction from our problems. And we don't know at the moment how long Han and Leni will need to get fit again. There's nothing wrong with making it a little more comfortable here while we have to wait."

Of course, my brother is right, I realize all that too. But, that doesn't mean we don't even talk about getting out of here anymore.

I would also want to shut down and forget everything. But I can't. Because I want to get out of here. I want our group to get out of here and that we can all go back home to our families. And in order to do that, I want us to explore all the options available for us, to know every nook and cranny of this facility, and to have different plans.

Me and Zhan don't care what the others say right now. We will start tomorrow to look around very, very carefully. So far, we've only looked roughly. But now I've had enough. Zhan is also fed up.

We're going to go from station to station and make a map of the facility. And we'll start in that creepy basement with all those cages! We'll be prepared just in case!

*~*~*

It's just after midnight and outside our door to the station, we overheard an argument. Yanli woke us up because she was the only one who noticed it when she came from the bathroom. From the sound of it, Rin and May were there arguing with their family. May kept yelling that she wanted to go to her friends and Rin was yelling that we were their friends and we didn't do anything to them, in fact we helped them.

My brother wanted to open the door, but Meng Yao and André stood in front of the door so he couldn't let them in. "Already forgotten what we were told? We were told to stay away from them and that we don't need to bring Rin and May to us. Leave them out there!" Meng Yao whispered.

Still, my brother tried to open the door and when he finally succeeded, no one was there.

We were all about to go back to our rooms when Elevator 1 opened. We barricaded it from the outside, so the person here couldn't just walk in to us. But my brother pulled everything aside and Rin fell into his arms. There was blood all over him. With the last of his strength he said, they're going to kill everyone, they're crazy. André tried to reanimate him, but could not.

During a brief examination, André found 15 stab wounds on Rin's body, from a knife. They really butchered him. What about May? Did they do the same to her? Are we to blame for not helping them?