Where The Mind Breaks

Chapter 10: The Poison Garden

The world had snapped into a different, harsher focus. The rain wasn't just rain anymore, it was a solvent, washing away the lies to reveal the ugly truth beneath. Nel walked back to the inn, the photograph a burning brand in his pocket. His father's face, that look of tortured complicity, was seared onto the back of his eyelids.

He found Silvera in her room, bent over a microscope set up on the small desk. Various plant specimens, pressed and labeled, were laid out beside it. She looked up as he entered, her sharp eyes taking in his disheveled state, the grim set of his jaw.

“What happened?” she asked, setting down a pair of tweezers.

He didn’t speak. He just pulled the photograph from his pocket and laid it on the desk next to her microscope.

Silvera looked down. She was silent for a long moment, her expression unreadable. Then she let out a slow, soft breath. “Oh, Nel.”

“He sold her,” Nel said, his voice flat, dead. “My father. He sold my sister to the Demmys for ten thousand dollars. And there was this guy, Alex”

He expected shock, outrage. Instead, Silvera nodded slowly, as if a terrible puzzle piece had just clicked into place. “It fits.”

“Fits what?” The deadness in his voice cracked, revealing the raw anger beneath.

“The pattern.” She gestured to her specimens. “I’ve been analyzing the flora around the lake, particularly near the caves. There’s a specific, hybridized fungus that grows there. It’s incredibly rare. Psychoactive. In small doses, it induces suggestibility, a trance-like state. In larger doses… permanent cognitive dissociation. It wipes the slate clean.”

Nel stared at her, the scientific terms failing to connect. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying the ‘poison garden’ isn’t a metaphor, Nel. It’s a real place. The Demmys aren’t just corrupt. They’re pharmacists. This fungus… it’s how they control people. It’s how they make problems… disappear.” She tapped the photograph. “They didn’t just pay your father. They probably used this on him first. To make him pliable. To make him do the unthinkable.”

The world tilted again. It wasn't just bribery. It was mind control. It was a horror far beyond anything he had imagined. His father, a victim as well as a perpetrator. The complexity of it was staggering.

“The Weeping…” Nel whispered.

“Was their first large-scale field test,” Silvera finished, her voice grim. “They perfected their method. They learned how to make people vanish, not just physically, but mentally. They could turn them into empty shells, or reprogram them entirely. The ‘disposals’ in the ledger… they weren’t all killed. Some of them were repurposed.”

Repurposed. The word was chilling. Was that what happened to Vivi? Was she not in a grave, but somewhere else, her mind wiped, living a different life? The thought was simultaneously horrifying and, perversely, a shred of hope.

“We have to find it,” Nel said, the new, cold purpose solidifying inside him. “The garden. We have to prove it.”

“It has to be in the caves,” Silvera said. “The conditions are perfect. Constant temperature, high humidity, shielded from prying eyes. And the guy, Alex… what did he want?”

“The ledger. He claims he’s federal, trying to bring down the Demmys for his own missing sister.”

Silvera’s eyes narrowed. “Do you believe him?”

“I don’t know. He dismissed the ‘poison garden’ as a metaphor. A fed, on a deep-cover mission, ignoring a key piece of his informant’s intel? It doesn’t add up.”

“Or,” Silvera countered quietly, “he knows exactly what it is, and he wants the ledger to bury the financial crimes and keep the real secret...the garden...hidden. Maybe his mission isn’t to expose the Demmys. Maybe it’s to protect their asset.”

The paranoia was a labyrinth with no exit. Everyone was a potential enemy. Every offer of help, a potential trap.

“We can’t trust him,” Nel said finally. “We can’t trust anyone. We do this ourselves. Tonight.”

Silvera didn’t argue. She simply nodded and began packing her gear...sample jars, a camera, a powerful flashlight. “We’ll need more than this. If we’re going into their heart, we need to be prepared.”

Nel went to his room and retrieved the ledger. It was no longer just a record of crimes, it was a map to a monstrous truth. He also took his father’s revolver from the duffel bag. This time, he wouldn’t leave it behind. This wasn't a job for ghosts anymore. It was a job for soldiers.

They waited until the town was asleep, until the only sound was the relentless rain. They moved like shadows through the dripping streets, back towards the bluffs and the cave where Nel had met Alex. This time, they didn't stop at the entrance. They went deeper.

The main chamber gave way to a narrow, downward-sloping tunnel. The air grew colder, the phosphorescent lichen more sparse. They used Silvera’s flashlight, its beam a brave, small spear against the consuming darkness. The sound of dripping water was joined by another sound...a faint, mechanical hum.

The tunnel opened into a second, much larger cavern.

And there it was.

The Poison Garden.

It wasn't soil and sunlight. It was a laboratory of nightmares. Long, stainless-steel tables held rows of clear, temperature-controlled terrariums. Inside, growing in a bluish, artificial light, were clusters of a pale, veiny fungus that seemed to pulse with a faint, sickly luminescence. The air was thick with a sweet, cloying scent that made Nel’s head swim.

Along the walls were cots. Simple, army-issue cots. A dozen of them. Some were empty. On others, figures lay still, their breathing shallow, IV lines running from their arms to bags of clear liquid.

They weren’t corpses. They were patients. Prisoners.

Silvera moved to the nearest cot, her professional detachment a stark contrast to the horror of the scene. She shone her light on the face of the occupant. An old man, his features slack, his eyes open and vacant.

“Frank Petty,” she whispered, her voice trembling for the first time. “One of the first to vanish during the Weeping. Dr.Sam signed his death certificate.”

He wasn’t dead. He was here, a living ghost, stored in the Demmys’ cold storage.

Nel moved down the line, his heart pounding, his dread a physical pain. He looked at each vacant, expressionless face, terrified and yet desperate to see one in particular.

He didn’t find Vivi.

But at the last cot, he stopped. The occupant was younger than the others. A woman. Her hair was short, her body frail, but her face…

It was Golda.

A choked sound escaped Nel’s throat. She wasn’t dead. Jason had lied. She was here, her mind wiped, a living piece of evidence neutralized and stored away.

The shock of it was so profound he almost didn’t hear the footsteps behind him.

He spun around, raising the revolver.

Alex stood at the tunnel entrance, a sleek, silenced pistol in his hand. He wasn’t looking at Nel. He was looking at the garden, his face a mixture of triumph and revulsion.

“I told you not to get distracted, Tait,” he said, his voice echoing softly in the cavern. “But I have to admit… you led me right to it.”

The beam of a second, more powerful flashlight cut through the gloom from behind Alex, illuminating Hedge and Jason Demmys as they stepped into the cavern. They weren’t surprised. They looked… satisfied.

Jason smiled, a cold, predatory thing. “Welcome to the family business, Nel.”

Hedge Demmys leaned on his cane, his eyes sweeping over his grotesque garden. “Everyone serves a purpose, son. Even you. You’ve just found yours.”

Alex leveled his pistol at Nel’s chest. The federal agent was gone. In his place was the Cleaner.

And Nel realized, too late, that he hadn’t found the heart of the darkness.

He was standing in it.