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They approach the door at the end of the dingy corridor. Tense and anxious, primed for a trap. For a fight. Melissa carefully reaches out and pushes down the handle. The door swings open with a loud creak, making them both jump and freeze. Nothing else happens. No one comes.
So they open the door more, and gasp. This room is quite large, and mostly empty. There are a few support pillars, and tied to one with rough, scratchy rope is a small, sleeping figure.
“Milo!” Zack exclaims automatically, then claps his hands over his mouth. They wait with bated breath for as long as they can bear, waiting for someone to come running. They wait for thirty seconds, before they finally decide that no one is coming. And they finally get to rush over to Milo.
Melissa crouches down on the floor to look at him. He is breathing, thank god, although shallowly, and he is slumped forward and unconscious. There are a few bruises and scrapes, but otherwise he looks alright. Immediately Zack starts untying the ropes with fumbling hands, while Melissa puts a hand on Milo’s shoulder. “Milo?”
No answer aside from soft breaths. At least they let him sleep this time, she thinks with fury. Something about all of this feels wrong, too easy. It had barely taken them minutes to work out where Milo was- in their time, not the future. In an abandoned building on the outskirts of town. Did they decide they didn’t have to put in so much effort, since it went so well for them last time?
Melissa squeezes Milo’s shoulder, and immediately feels bad about it. She knows that it upsets him and reminds him of his time in captivity, but she just needs to wake him… still, nothing. She leans closer to look, even more worried. Maybe he isn’t just asleep, maybe he’s drugged? That feels like a sick sort of joke these people would pull, force him to stay awake the first time and then drug him into unconsciousness the second time.
Zack finishes untying the ropes and Milo immediately slumps forward like a sad sack of potatoes. Zack lunges to catch him. “He’s completely out of it, isn’t he?”
“Maybe we should just get him out of here and right to the hospital.” Melissa suggests, looking anxiously at the unconscious boy in Zack’s arms. “Do you think that we can carry him if I take the legs and you take the shoulders?”
“Prob-“ Zack’s response is cut off by a sudden punch to the face. It has a lot of force behind it, sending him backwards. His back smacks off of the hard floor and he winces, then looks down in shock at the boy in his arms.
Or no longer in his arms, because after he punched him Milo shot to his feet like he was never even asleep. Melissa jumps to her feet and turns to look at him, shocked. And upset. What did they do that would make him react like that to waking suddenly? Her blood boils. “Milo, it’s alright! It’s us, it’s just us. Just Melissa and Zack. We’re here to take you home.”
Milo turns his attention to her, and she furrows her brows. His eyes are weird and glassy, almost empty. And absolutely, obviously not right. “Zack, I don’t think this is Milo.”
“What? What does that even mean?!” Zack exclaims, rubbing the back of his head and scrambling to stand up too.
“I don’t know, it’s his body, but…” She knows her best friend. She has known him since grade school, she has been through so much which him, she knows him like she knows herself. And that isn’t Milo. His stance is too upright, his expression is too serious, his eyes are glazed and dull and so wrong they make her shiver.
Applause echoes through the empty room, making them both jump. “Very clever.” And then the door opens, and a woman with curly brown hair in a blue hoodie appears. “You figured it out! What a smart kid. Isn’t she, Penelope?” She puts her hand up to an earphone.
Melissa backs up to shield both Zack and Milo’s body, anger and fear pounding through her. “You’re Sally.” She says, voice shaking.
“Wow, she’s so smart! Two correct deductions in one minute, I’ve heard if you get three you get a prize.” Sally says. “So what do you think we did to him?”
Melissa looks back at ‘Milo’. “You’re…. you’re controlling him. You’ve like, mind controlled him or something, with evil future tech.” She guesses, and she finds that when her words come out they are laced with anger. How dare they. How dare they do that to her best friend.
“Ding ding ding! What a clever girl.” Sally claps, beaming. Melissa sneaks a glance back at Zack, who looks utterly horrified. A feeling that must be reflected on her own face. “Unfortunately, you weren’t quite clever enough to figure out the obvious trap. Better luck next time, I guess!” Her laugh grates at Melissa’s brain like nails on a chalk board as she tells herself off. It was an obvious trap. One she fell for.
“But, I suppose you did make three correct statements in one minute, and I did offer you a prize! How about your friend back?” Sally asks, tilting her head to one side.
“Give him back, right now!” Melissa snaps, stepping closer. A hand on her arm yanks her back, so hard that she is sent flailing to the floor. The hand was so familiar, warm and calloused and covered in scrapes and grazes. But being controlled by someone so cruel and cold.
“Milo!” Zack exclaims when Melissa hits the floor with a clatter, even though he knows it isn’t really Milo. “Melissa, are you-“
“I’m fine.” She gets to her feet again, watching as Milo’s body moves past her to stand next to Sally. Sally is smiling smugly.
“Sorry, I forgot to tell you. He doesn’t like it when someone threatens me.” She says, and then reaches out to pat his head. She leaves her hand there after. Melissa’s skin crawls, but she doesn’t make another move. “He’s cute, isn’t he? And much more well behaved now.”
“You’re sick.” Zack says numbly, in complete disbelief about what is happening. About what has been done to his friend. Usually so bright and happy, always bouncy and fidgety and unable to stand still. Now he stands like a board at Sally’s side, staring into space with an empty numbness that looks horribly out of place.
“So many compliments from you lot, are you sure we’re enemies?” Sally cackles. “I’m not sick. This isn’t even about him at all, really. This technology is new, I just wanted to test it on someone else before we deployed it on actual projects. Imagine if I could use this on B.O.T.T agents? The access to their facilities, the ability to trick them… oh, it’ll be just perfect. Ah, but look at me monologuing. You don’t care about any of that, do you? Just your prize.”
“Stop calling him that, and give him back! You’ve tested it, it works, so let him go!” Melissa says, although she keeps herself planted in place.
“I have some further testing to do, so here’s the plan. I’m going to leave you three alone.” She says, beaming. “Although I’ll keep an eye on you, of course. Don’t want you getting into mischief. You can have your little walking disaster back-“ She ruffles his hair. “- if you can get him out.”
Melissa’s heart is in her throat now. “What does that mean?”
“Well, I won’t stop you from leaving! If you leave with him, you get to keep him! If you can’t leave with him, then I’m afraid you’ll have to decide between staying with him, or leaving alone.” Sally explains. “And he might not want to come.”
She turns to leave, clicking her finger as she goes. The door slams shut, although they don’t hear a key in the lock. And then ‘Milo’ lunges for her.
Melissa dodges out of the way just in time, but Milo’s body immediately turns on his heel and lunges again. She dodges, he lunges. He is utterly relentless, with none of Milo’s compassion. With a skill at fighting that Milo definitely doesn’t have.
“What do we do?!” Zack exclaims. “How are we gonna get him out of here?!”
Turning her attention to Zack for one second was one second too long. Milo tackles her into the wall, and she cries out in surprise. “Melissa!” Zack exclaims, rushing over.
“I’m fine!” She grunts, trying to shove Milo off of her. He holds on tight, pushing her into the ground painfully. She reminds herself that this isn’t Milo and with one heave sends him sprawling backwards. She shoots up and dashes back to Zack. “We need to stop him from fighting us so we can get him out of here, then we can figure out how to stop her from controlling him.”
“But how?!” Zack asks, and is promptly tackled. ‘Milo’ digs his knees into his stomach, making him wince, then raises his hand for a blow. Zack yelps, unable to jerk away in time. “Ow!”
Melissa grabs Milo’s body from behind, under the armpits, and yanks him backwards. “You ok?” She asks Zack hurriedly, trying desperately to hold onto the flailing and still bent on violence boy. It hurts her, much more than any blow, to see Milo like this. But it isn’t Milo, it’s just some sick person using his body as a puppet, and she needs to stay focused.
“Yeah, but what about him? How do we stop him?” Zack asks. ‘Milo’ pulls out of Melissa’s grasp and turns around to throw himself at her. He pins her to the ground, digging his fingers painfully into her arms.
“I’ve got him! You… you get the rope, and be ready for my signal.” She says, wriggling in the iron grip.
Zack’s eyes widen. “Are we gonna-“
“We don’t have any other options.” Melissa murmurs, heart heavy. Then she turns her focus entirely onto the boy on top of her. “Hey, Milo. You gonna get off? This kinda hurts.”
No response, not even a flicker of a reaction in those empty eyes. She didn’t expect one. She takes a deep breath, then with all her might throws ‘Milo’ off. He clatters onto the floor in a way that would’ve made anyone cry out in pain. But Milo’s body doesn’t do that. He just rolls over and gets up, despite the pain.
Melissa scrambles to her feet. She hates this, she hates this so much. Fighting Milo, hurting Milo, feels so foreign and wrong. But that isn’t Milo, and she knows that he would tell her to do it if he could. Milo wouldn’t want her to get hurt for him, and he would want her to fight him, even hurt him, if that’s what she needs to do to keep herself and Zack safe and bring him back to himself. So she will do that, even if it hurts her.
She dodges to avoid a lunge, and then hits out, but despite the blow landing the thing barely flinches. He just keeps coming at her, with a flurry of blows. She can only dodge some, and the ones that hit are painful, and knock her off course much more than a blow from her can knock him off course. They keep trading blows, but she is tiring. He isn’t. He just keeps coming, relentless and quick as ever.
She needs to end this now. Muttering an apology, she hooks her foot around ‘Milo’s’ ankle and knocks it out from under him, sending him flying to the ground with an almighty thud. Before he can get up again, she dives down and holds him down, a tight grip that is sure to hurt. “Zack!” She yells out, desperately holding down the struggling boy underneath her. “Now!”
She hears footsteps running towards her as Milo’s body fights against her grip. She presses him harder into the floor, wincing as she does so. She can imagine how much this must hurt, imagine how much it will hurt him later when he is himself again. But it will all be worth it if they can bring him back.
Thankfully, Zack appears at her side with a coil of rope. Milo’s body starts struggling even more fiercely, with such force and panic that she wishes she could just let him go. She doesn’t, though. She holds him so Zack, with hands shaking so much he nearly drops the rope, can bind him tightly. He writhes and tries to claw at Zack, managing to get some good scratches in, but then Zack finishes and backs away.
“Sally!” Melissa cries out, panting. “We got him, now stop it!”
“Did I say ‘if you catch him’?” Sally’s voice comes from nowhere, light and teasing. “I said if you can leave with him, and it looks like he’s still here!”
Melissa and Zack share a panicked look. ‘Milo’ is still fighting, and the thought of trying to wrangle him out of the building feels utterly impossible. But what choice do they have?
Melissa does her best to stand up, while holding onto a struggling boy the same size as her. Even with him restrained, he is too strong strong and struggling too much. Zack grabs on and helps her haul him up, even though he looks extremely uncomfortable the whole time.
And then begins the most difficult few metres of their lives. Milo’s body may be restrained, may be injured, but isn’t giving up. He throws himself around, managing to shove both himself and the two of them into the walls. He throws himself to the floor, earning a nasty bump to the head. He kicks out violently at them when they try to pick him back up, and headbutts them as they keep struggling towards the exit.
They don’t walk out of the building, they fall. The three of them land together, and Melissa and Zack turn to look at Milo in panic. Milo looks just as he did before, eyes glassy and empty, stance stiff and ready… and then he flops backwards like a rag doll, head hitting the gravel roughly.
Hardly daring to hope, Melissa crawls to crouch next to him. She checks his pulse, checks his breathing, and he’s fine. Just asleep again. Like he was turned off. “Did we… do it?” Zack asks, extremely out of breath.
“I think so.” Melissa pants. “But what do we do now? If we call an ambulance and he starts doing that again…”
———
The first thing Milo notices when he wakes up is that he has a pounding headache. The second thing that he notices is that everything else hurts too. And the third thing he notices is that his hands are still tightly bound behind him.
In his groggy, pained state, all he can think is that he is still a prisoner. Still tied up in that horrible, cold room, while Sally taunts and teases him and Penelope works silently on him with sharp tools and strange machinery.
But then the memories flood back. His body acting without his consent, without his permission. First just walking, picking up things, other simple tasks, and even that had felt horrible. He had tried to disobey orders, but it was like he was simply a passive observer in his own body.
And then he had been forced to fight his friends. He remembers it now, so clearly. Screaming and yelling and desperately trying to force his body to stop. He hadn’t been able to stop, had only been able to watch as his body hurt his friends.
And now he realises what must be going on. “Melissa, Zack!”
His voice sounds croaky, but it immediately has his friends rushing to his side. “Milo?” Zack asks, voice nervous and cautious. Which is understandable, but makes Milo want to hide away in shame.
“Hey, Milo. You back with us?” Melissa crouches next to him, taking his face in her hands as she looks in his eyes. Whatever she sees there, combined with his own nod, clearly reassures her because she immediately hugs him. “You scared us, you big idiot.”
“I’m sorry…” He mumbles, voice choked with tears. He wants nothing more than to melt into her embrace, but the last time he touched her he was attacking her, hurting her.
She pulls back from the hug to look at him again, and all he can see is the purple bruise blooming on her face. “Don’t apologise! Why are you apologising? We know it wasn’t you, it was them.”
“Exactly.” Zack joins her at his side, crouching to look into his eyes. He is bruised too, and Milo can remember his own arm punching him in the face, can remember the feeling. The horror that had flooded through him after that first punch, when he realised what he was about to be forced to do. “It’s not your fault, so you’re not allowed to apologise.”
“That makes sense.” Milo has to concede, and this time when his friends hug him he melts into the hug. “Thank you for rescuing me.”
“Any time.” Melissa says. “Here, let me untie you. We weren’t sure if Sally would take control of you again, so…” She reaches for the rope.
Milo tenses. “Wait! I think… did you get the thing on my neck off?”
He takes the utter confusion on their faces as a no. “I think she was controlling me through a thing on the back of my neck. You should take it off, or she could…” He trails, but what he means is obvious.
He sits up, wincing as he jostles his many bruises, and then turns around to Melissa and Zack can get at the back of his neck. Now he can see exactly where he is- the sofa in Cavendish and Dakota’s office. “They’ve gone to fetch your parents.” Zack explains. “We weren’t sure where else to go this is the first place we could think of taking you to.”
“There’s definitely something here.” Melissa reports. “It’s really small. It reminds me of a tick… I’m getting tweezers. Hang on.” She seems reluctant to leave Milo’s side, but she does, coming back a few seconds later with the tweezers. And she pulls it out.
Milo squeaks. And then relief floods through him. He hadn’t really noticed the overwhelming sense of being trapped, a sense of control that made him feel restricted and wrong. And now he feels normal, he feels free.
The calendar falls off of the wall. “There’s Murphy’s Law.” He says, a smile spreading across his face. “So I think that worked.”
Immediately Zack unties the ropes binding his hands, and he is engulfed in yet another hug. This time he is able to hug them back, as tight and squeezing as possible. “I love you guys, you know that right?”
———
Once his parents get there, he is immediately shipped off to hospital, despite his insistence that he is fine. The doctor confirms that he is alright, so he spends his time watching every adult telling Melissa and Zack off for going after him themselves. First his own parents, then Cavendish and Dakota (apparently for the second time), and then their own parents when they show up.
While Zack is getting chewed out by his extremely worried parents, Melissa sits on the end of Milo’s bed and takes his hand. “How are you?”
“Alright.” He says. “But I feel… bad. Them controlling my body, when all I could do was watch as my body hurt you… that is the scariest thing that has ever happened to me. I know they would’ve kept going and killed you if you hadn’t stopped me.” He looks down at his lap, then up at Melissa again. “So thank you for stopping me. I’m so glad that you did.”
“I can’t imagine what that felt like.” Melissa squeezes his hand. “I hated fighting you, you know that? Even thought I knew it wasn’t really you, it felt awful to hurt you like that. But I knew you would want me to, so I did.” She shuffles closer. “You’re my best friend and I’d do anything for you. So if I have to kick your ass to save you I will.”
“Thanks, Melissa.” Milo leans forward to rest his forehead against her shoulder, and immediately her arms come to hug him. They melt into each other. This is his best friend since grade school, and he knows her like he knows himself. And he would do anything for her too.