Chapter 164
Emily's POV
The next day, after failing to get any useful information, we decided to contact Rory's father, who agreed to take him home.
"His father has picked him up," Michael said. "We've also warned him to watch for unusual behavior."
"What about his mother?" Thomas asked, joining us.
"Stella's been diagnosed with schizophrenia," Michael explained. "She's sedated at the hospital psychiatric ward. We can't get much from her right now."
Thomas frowned. "Someone's trying to stop our investigation."
"But why take Rory?" Daisy wondered. "What's the connection?"
Nolan, who had been quietly listening in the corner, spoke up: "Could be an extreme religious group. Some of them run so-called 'rehabilitation centers' for troubled youth."
"Or conversion therapy," I suggested, the pieces clicking together in my mind like a morbid puzzle. "Rory mentioned being 'fixed' from his 'desires.' Some underground organizations still practice it despite the bans."
Michael nodded. "Daniel, check Stella's bank records. See if she's been paying anyone unusual."
Daniel looked up from his computer. "Already on it. No large payments, but she makes monthly donations to the church—$200-300 each month."
"It's the same church you visited before," Daniel added.
---
Three days of investigation had yielded nothing. The game seemed to appear out of nowhere. No developers. No download sources. No digital footprint. Like chasing a ghost.
I sat at my desk, staring at the case board. Something about Rory's case was bothering me. According to his teacher, he had behavioral issues before he ever touched the game. The game didn't create these problems—it only amplified or directed them.
Stella wasn't lucid enough for questioning yet.
"Emily! You need to see this."
Daisy burst into the break room where I was listlessly picking at a salad. She thrust her phone in my face, playing a video that had clearly gone viral overnight.
The blurry footage showed a tall teenager dragging a small girl—about seven or eight years old—across a community lawn. The girl was screaming, her head hitting something hard enough to leave blood on the ground. A man tried to intervene, only to be struck in the face. An elderly woman who approached was kicked to the ground. Another man grabbed a rake in defense, but the boy picked up a rock and threw it with surprising accuracy.
What shocked me most wasn't the violence—it was his face. Throughout the entire assault, his expression remained completely blank. No anger. No emotion. Just... empty. Even when three men finally subdued him, he continued struggling, maintaining the same vacant stare.
"Don't you think the teenager looks familiar?" Daisy said.
"Isn't that Neal?"
"Yes, he's beating his own sister! It's so strange."
I watched Neal in the video, hitting people with no expression, showing no anger at all. His eyes were empty.
I found Michael in his office and closed the door behind me.
"Someone is taking troubled teenagers and doing something to them—changing them somehow. But clearly it's failing," I showed Michael the video.
"You mean they're trying to eliminate these kids' aggression?"
"Their bad behavior," I speculated. "I suspect they're picking out potential criminals and reforming them."
This reminded me of Caitlin's ideal—her greatest dream: to use psychological data models to predict potential criminals, then change them through education, stopping crime before it begins.
And now it seemed someone was trying to fulfill her ideal. I felt panic rising in my chest.
"Let's get some information first," Michael said, grabbing his jacket.
---
At the precinct handling Neal's case, the officer in charge flipped through a depressing file.
"Fighting, theft, vandalism, robbery—you name it, he's done it. Then about three months ago, he suddenly became normal. No incidents. Good behavior. We thought he might have finally grown up." The officer shook his head. "Then yesterday this happened. He attacked his own sister and fought like an animal with anyone who tried to stop him."
"What did he say?" Michael asked.
"He just kept repeating 'I need to take my sister home.' Didn't seem to understand he'd hurt her. It took four officers to subdue him—the kid has strength you wouldn't believe."
"Can we talk to him?"
Neal sat in the interrogation room, bruises on his face, marks on his wrists showing where restraints had been. He kept his head down, avoiding eye contact. He looked... docile.
"Neal, why did you hurt your sister?"
"I didn't hurt her," he insisted when I asked about his sister. "I just needed to take her home."
"Your sister was bleeding, Neal."
"Dad said I had to bring her home before six. I'm a good son. Good sons listen to their parents."
His vocabulary was limited, his expression childish. When I asked if anyone had taken him somewhere or done something to him, he just repeated, "I've been home. I'm a good kid."
Michael and I exchanged a glance, increasingly convinced that Neal's condition was artificially induced, likely similar to Rory's case.
"Did your mom and dad ever send you to a strange place?"
Neal shook his head dully. "Don't know what you're talking about. I've always stayed at home, never went anywhere. My dad doesn't let me go out randomly."
"What happens if you don't listen to your mom and dad?" I asked.
Neal looked bewildered, only able to respond vaguely: "Good kids must listen to their mom and dad."
Like Rory, Neal had also lost a portion of his memory, making it nearly impossible to get useful information from him.
"After he was restrained, he was still struggling desperately. But when his father came, he suddenly went quiet," the officer in charge added.
I fell into deep thought. Neal now was like a trained dog, obedient but without self-awareness.
Such a state was terrifying. It wasn't that he had no aggression—his aggression was just hidden.
"Similar to Rory's situation, parents wanting to transform their children into obedient kids who listen to them."
"Could be," I wasn't certain of the answer either, but things weren't that simple.
We decided to go to the hospital to talk with Neal's parents.