Perceptions and Deceptions

The effort is minimal this time. Cassie sees the door before her, opens it, and she is there.

And now she can see more "there" than last time. The little room that Gina created now has a window overlooking a scene of idyllic winter beauty. The pure white snow gleams, as if possessing an inner glow of its own. The road is majestic, wide and pristine, stretching forth into a distant horizon of radiance.

Yet it is a window only. No door exists to this wondrous wintry world. And now the door to the interior of the house -- or rather, to the part of Gina's mind still usurped by Victor -- now sports a large padlock.

"I had to keep him out," Gina says. Her voice is less anxious, her eyes less wild. She does not wring her hands. "I may have pushed it too far earlier, but I think I'm okay now."

Cassie looks out the window again. She wonders if Gina understands the symbolism of all this white. Is she trying to recapture a lost purity or innocence? Or possibly manufacture one that she never had?

"I can see it," Gina says, urgency creeping into her voice as if in demand of acknowledgement. "I can't reach it yet, but it's there."

Cassie draws closer to the window and squints into the distance. "This is strange. I can't see anything in all the white, but I feel like something should be there."

Gina comes alongside her. Cassie can sense Gina is trembling even across the space between them. "I know," Gina says in a very low voice. "Maybe ... maybe it's Stephanie."

Cassie turns away from the window and is struck by the intensity of Gina's eyes. "I don't think so, Gina."

"But she helped me before. She ... she fought it. She..."

Her words trail off, eyes shimmering. Cassie realizes she is radiating her doubt like a beacon, but there is some truth to Gina's words. "Yes, she did, in ... in a way."

Cassie tries not to think about Stephanie's horrible fate, but her thoughts seem linked to Gina's emotions. Gina shrinks back and shivers as if cold.

"Gina, Stephanie did stop him from taking her as a slave, but ... but she couldn't--"

Gina shakes her head. Fear shimmers in her eyes again.

Cassie squeezes Gina's hand and looks into her glistening eyes. "She didn't have anyone helping her. You do."

Gina takes a breath, and it catches as she lets it go. "It's not enough. Victor almost caught me. I almost lost all of this. I had to shut him out."

Cassie squeezes her hand again. "Gina, listen to me--"

"Less than a day! I have less than a day before--!"

"Gina, stop it. You don't understand what resources I can call on. It's just that we have to wait until Halloween night."

"But only a day! I still don't know what or who I am, or what I should be if I'm free of Victor."

"My friends and I may be able to help you with that," says Cassie, but she holds little confidence in her own words. She realizes now that to someone that has been held in restraints all her life, freedom could be every bit as paralyzing as imprisonment.

"I need Stephanie," Gina says.

Cassie tilts her head. "I don't understand."

"I'm connected to her somehow. It's ... it's almost like maybe she was someone that I could have been."

Cassie is unwilling to reveal her initial thoughts. The Stephanie she had met in school had struck her as a bit shallow, but she wonders if that was only after Victor's influence took hold. "I think it is more that you admire her spirit," Cassie finally says.

"You still don't understand!" Gina cries. "I'm still an empty shell. Victor is giving me purpose."

"Being a slave is not--"

"Let me finish! I don't want his purpose. But what do I have to pit against it? I'm fighting myself as much as Victor. How can I offer nothing in exchange for something?"

Cassie nods slowly, and she is at a loss for a response. She sees the problem: with no personal will or ambition, freedom would be more terrifying than slavery.

"That's what's out there," Gina says, turning towards the window. "The road leads to the old cemetery at the other end where I first met her. I was only a few fleeting thoughts and doubts until I met her, then I became this."

"I understand what you're saying, Gina, but what I don't know is what you expect from her."

Gina is silent for a long moment, then asks the question that Cassie has been dreading. "What happened to her? I stopped seeing her just before you showed up."

"She ... she fought him but ... but she's a prisoner in her own mind."

Gina spins around, eyes wide and staring.

"He was never able to take her as a slave, but he managed to keep her quiet. Stephanie sits in ... i-in a horrible little cage with Victor still--"

"She's just like me!"

Cassie falls silent.

"Don't you get it? We're both trapped. We're both prisoners inside ourselves. But she has a life. She has something to go back to if she ever gets free. I don't. If ... if I could link to her somehow ... if I could get Gina's mind to see what her life could be like--"

Cassie nods. "Yes, I understand! But ... oh, Gina, you don't know what you're asking! She's literally locked inside her head. I'm not sure anyone could break her out now."

Gina grasps Cassie's hands and squeezes until the fingers tingle. "Please, I need her. I-I'm begging you, please."

Cassie's eyes blur, and she blinks away the tears that threaten to form. "I'll try. I'll really try."

Gina smiles. Tears flood Cassie's eyes and stream down her cheeks. She hugs Gina before retreating through the door.

Cassie once more stands in the pastel kaleidescope that is the Dreamverse. She hears the soft, enticing whispers of people's thoughts and memories that she has attracted to herself by her mere presence. She longs for the days when she was only a passive receiver of their tiny slices of life and could ponder them as no more than an exercise of creative thought.

She is not sure where to begin. Would it be that simple? Could she just will the door to Stephanie's psyche into existence?

Cassie gasps and stumbles back as a door materializes out of the ether.

She stares in rapt amazement, then increasing trepidation. The door is of iron, thick rivets marching along its frame and slashes of rust stretching like wounds across its dully gleaming surface. She touches the door and shivers at the chill. She steels herself and pushes the door open, and is astonished to see Stephanie's cage.

From the inside.

Stephanie is curled up on the floor, shivering and moaning. The realm past the bars is utterly black, darker than Cassie ever remembered it, as if the cage is suspended in a void, infinitely far from everything.

Cassie steps through, and her skin becomes clammy and cold. Stephanie lifts her head, then cries out. She scrambles to the edge of the cage, her eyes cold with fear.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," Cassie says in a quavering voice.

"You shouldn't have come here again!" Stephanie cries. Her eyes widen, and her mouth drops open. "My God ... how did you ... h-how did you open it inside--?"

Cassie lays a hand over her racing heart. "You mean you don't know how I can do this?"

Stephanie rises and shakes her head, eyes wide.

"Stephanie, does this mean I can free you? I can do this with Gina, too, and I can feed her power through it. If I could do the same with you..."

Stephanie shakes her head violently. "No, please don't, don't try it. Oh God, Cassie, don't mess this up! Don't make some stupid rescue attempt on me! I can't get out of this cage no matter what anyone tries."

"Gina says she needs you."

Stephanie does not respond. She turns away and stares out into the black.

Cassie's eyes mist. "She says she needs to connect with you. Stephanie, she's been BRED to be a slave. She virtually has no life she can call her own."

Stephanie collapses against the bars of the cage. Cassie rushes forward but cannot stop Stephanie from sinking to the floor. "Oh God, I had h-hoped I was w-wrong," Stephanie whimpers.

"What?"

Stephanie closes her eyes and grips the bars until her knuckles turn white. "Stuff I heard from Charles ... s-sometimes from Victor ... I-I guess I knew all along. Somehow I knew. But this is just beyond ... I c-can't..."

Cassie's eyes dart with frantic urgency, searching for anything that could help, not just in her own mind but in her surroundings as well. She looks into the void again and shudders. If Stephanie could open her cage, would she plunge into an unending abyss? Has she been so separated from the rest of her mind that there was no hope of reuniting with it?

Finally, her eyes fall on the door. "Stephanie, could you come through the door with me?"

Stephanie looks up. Her eyes dart from the door back to Cassie and shivers. She swallows and shakes her head.

"Are you sure? Maybe that's why I can open doors past Victor's control!"

"Cassie, you're not thinking!" Stephanie wails. "I-I'm still everything that I was. Everything out there is just a shell. If I leave, it's like ripping the soul from someone's body!"

A wave of nausea sickens Cassie as she recalls the Rite of Power and how horribly empty Heather and Diane appeared when Melissa stole their spirits from their bodies. She feels ashamed for even considering the idea.

Stephanie touches Cassie's arm. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get you so upset."

Cassie waits for her tears to stop. She sniffles once and wipes her face. "It's okay. Y-You're right, I wasn't thinking. But surely there's something we can do? Gina needs something to hold on to or it will be impossible to free her and keep her free."

Stephanie looks lost, and it tears at Cassie's heart. Stephanie raises her eyes to the door again. "Cassie, I'm still trying to understand. You're using this power as easily as breathing. I don't think I could've ever developed it like this even if Victor had never bothered with me."

Cassie cannot help feel a small degree of pride. "So you can't open doors like this?"

"No, not at all, not even before I gave most of my power to you. Look how hard it was to get through to you just in your dreams every year."

Cassie sighs and nods. "If I gave you some energy--"

"And do what? I can't leave here."

"But if you could connect to Gina somehow, and just reassure her."

"I don't know if I can, Cassie!" Stephanie cries.

"Please try," Cassie begs, her eyes tearing again. She hates herself. Stephanie has been through too much. She does not deserve to have more demands placed upon her. "Please. My friends and I will be performing ... um ... will be doing something to tap into the power of the lines. I can give you some of that energy. Then you can try to contact Gina."

Stephanie sighs and whimpers. "I-I'll try," she says in a very tiny voice.

Cassie sniffles again and wipes her eyes. "Thank you." She retreats to the door. "Stephanie, you say you can't come through the door. How did you send your Presence through the lines?"

"I can open a portal into the line energy," Stephanie explains. "You probably can, too. You just have to remember to leave it open behind you when you project yourself. You can't close it behind you, ever, or you lose that piece of yourself forever."

Cassie nods. "You were the one that saved me last night, weren't you?"

"Yes. I sensed you were too close to Melinda's psyche. You would've been enslaved by the cult if you entered."

Cassie shudders.

"Be more careful, Cassie, please. You can't get into the head of someone that's been enslaved unless you already know of someplace safe to link to."

Cassie feels foolish for failing to figure that out herself, as now it is obvious. "I will. I wish there was more I could do for you."

"Just stop Victor, that's all I care about anymore."

Cassie forces herself to leave, closing the door behind her.