ILLUSIONS
by
AUTHOR D
Chapter 1
The Chapters
“Keep an eye on your brother.”
Nineteen-year-old Frank Hardy, glanced in the rearview mirror at his younger brother, his father’s words fresh in his mind. A little less than two months earlier Frank and Joe had been assisting their father and the local police in attempting to find the source of some highly potent hallucinogenic drugs that had suddenly appeared on the streets of Bayport.
Apparently someone had attempted to change the composition of the drug PCP, hoping to increase its already powerful properties, giving the user an unheard of high. The effects however had been tragic.
The enhanced hallucinations had been more overpowering than anyone had anticipated and apparently very real to the user causing reactions previously unseen anywhere.
Many users committed suicide, convinced it was the only way to escape the seemingly real terrors that existed only in their drugged minds.
Others went on violent rampages, committing crimes so heinous they staggered even the most hardened law enforcement officials.
Some did recover, in time, although more ended up as residents of the local psychiatric hospital, with the hopes of them leading normal lives again minimal, at best.
Going undercover as potential dealers, Frank and Joe had indeed found the source of the drugs. However, hours before the culmination of the sting operation with the anticipated arrest of those in the highest levels of the distribution ring, their cover was blown.
In an effort to evade capture, they had split up, decreasing their chances of being caught. Frank had escaped and been able to warn his father and the law enforcement agencies involved. Joe, however, hadn’t been quite so lucky.
Once caught, he was injected with a large amount of the drug and left in the warehouse, assuming that the local police, at least initially, would be more concerned with saving Joe’s life than catching those responsible.
Both Frank and Fenton Hardy had been witness to Joe’s initial reaction to the drugs that had taken over his mind and body although neither was prepared for the devastating consequences. They could only guess as to what Joe thought he was seeing when he grabbed the gun of one of the officers attempting to restrain him and went on a shooting rampage, his father being the first target. Quick reflexes saved Fenton from serious injury, although he, Frank and the Bayport police officers who had accompanied them had to take cover and wait until Joe was out of ammunition before attempting to subdue him again.
Joe had ended up hallucinating so badly, that he had been deemed a danger to himself and others and admitted to the psychiatric wing of Bayport General Hospital.
Having a severe reaction to the drugs, he’d been heavily sedated, physically restrained and placed in isolation for a seventy-two hour observation period during which all visitors were strictly prohibited. After the completion of the mandatory isolation period, he was moved to a private room and placed on a suicide watch for another three days, slowly regaining control of his own mind with each passing day. It was another few days after that before he was finally released from the hospital to the custody of his parents.
Never having seen this new ‘designer’ version of PCP, doctors were at a loss as to how they could prepare the Hardy family for what to expect and warned that there could be residual after effects of the drug for a while. They cautioned Joe and the Hardys that he could still face some hallucinations, clearly seeing things that didn’t exist or might totally misconstrue something he saw that was perfectly innocent. The doctors did offer hope that the hallucinations and misperceptions would decrease in intensity and severity as time went by, but were adamant that the only ‘cure’ would be time itself.
Frank had hoped they might be wrong, but much to his horror they weren’t. Joe continued to have hallucinations, both visual and auditory, some of them terrifying in their intensity. After each episode, Joe would insist it wasn’t that bad and they were indeed getting better, though Frank could tell by the haunted look in his brother’s eyes that Joe was lying.
The whole incident had given all of them a bad enough scare that Fenton and Laura Hardy insisted the boys take a break from mysteries for a while. With Joe starting his freshman year in college and Frank entering his sophomore year, there was more than enough to keep them both occupied without delving into any new mysteries no matter how innocent they might seem. When Joe readily agreed to their parents’ suggestion, Frank knew the younger boy was more shaken than he’d ever admit.
Two weeks had passed without Joe experiencing a hallucination of any kind and while it was encouraging, his parents and brother were still extremely worried. But having left the house only to attend classes up to this point, Joe had begun showing signs of cabin fever.
In an effort to help him return to ‘normalcy’, Frank and Joe’s friends had arranged tonight’s outing, assuming that if Joe were surrounded by friends, his parents would be more open to the idea of his attempting to resume his normal activities.
And so Frank found himself behind the wheel of his car, chauffeuring himself, his girlfriend Callie Shaw, Joe and Joe’s girlfriend Vanessa Bender to ‘Frightland’ where they would meet up with the rest of their circle of friends for a night of scary, Halloween hauntings.
An annual event in Bayport, Frightland was a charity event stretched out over the entire month of October. An old barn, farmhouse and the surrounding fields were donated by a local farmer and transformed into the epitome of terror. The house and barn were haunted by local actors portraying various characters and ghostly creatures both dead and alive, whose sole purpose was to scare the visitors out of their minds. The cornfields were turned into a dizzying maze also inhabited by otherworldly guests making the visitors’ trek to freedom all the more harrowing.
Given the fact that Joe seemed to have been held hostage in his own private fright-fest for the past six weeks, Frank was leery of the choice of activity, but Joe had endorsed it whole-heartedly. As he pulled into a parking space, he could hear Joe on his cell phone trying to determine where the rest of their friends were and arrange a meeting place.
Snapping the phone shut, Joe leaned forward just as Frank cut the engine. “Everyone else is here already,” Joe said, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “They’re waiting for us next to the ticket booth. C’mon, hurry up!” he finished, already halfway out of the car and tugging Vanessa behind him.
Frank glanced at his girlfriend and shook his head with a smile. Getting out of the car, he walked around to the passenger side and opened the door for her, then slipped an arm around Callie’s shoulder.
“He’s not excited or anything is he?” Callie observed with a grin as Joe and Vanessa quickly outpaced them.
Frank shrugged. “He hasn’t been anywhere except school and home for the past six weeks.”
Callie seemed to hesitate for a moment and then looked at Frank, her _expression much more serious. “How’s he really doing?”
Frank pursed his lips and exhaled slowly. “Better, I think. He says he’s doing better and I honestly haven’t seen any… problems… in almost two weeks.”
Callie reached up and clasped her fingers through Frank’s hand as it dangled over her shoulder. “Good. I hope he has a really good time tonight,” she smiled.
“Yeah, me too.”
As they approached their circle of friends they could hear the excited chatter as everyone tossed out suggestions on where to start first. After purchasing their tickets the large group headed for the entrance.
At first they all stayed fairly close together but as the night wore on and they meandered through the corn maze, house and surrounding land they spread out and got separated. Through it all, however, Frank made sure he stayed close to Joe. When he began to follow Joe and Vanessa towards the old barn, Joe finally turned around and glared at him, obviously trying to maintain a thin grip on his patience.
“Frank,” Joe said, exasperated. “I want to spend some time with my girlfriend… alone!”
Frank flushed at the implication, thankful that it was dark out. He knew Joe was bristling at his pathetic attempts to shadow the younger couple. But after being monitored almost 24/7 for close to two months, he knew Joe just wanted to be left alone for a while without feeling as if his every move were being analyzed – and he sympathized with the younger boy. Still, genuine concern for Joe – and the fact that his parents had agreed to the outing only if Frank stuck close to his brother - was weighing heavily on him.
Apparently sensing an imminent explosion from her boyfriend, Vanessa tried to reach a compromise they could both live with. “How about Joe and I explore the barn alone for… half an hour?” she looked at Joe who gave a heavy sigh but eventually nodded his agreement before continuing. “Then we’ll meet you right back here, okay?”
When Frank hesitated, Vanessa shoved her hand into Joe’s jacket pocket and pulled out his cell phone, holding it aloft. “We’re only one button away from you if we need you,” she smiled hopefully.
Reaching out, Joe grabbed Frank’s sleeve and pulled him out of earshot of Callie and Vanessa. “Come on, Frank,” he begged. “I know Mom and Dad don’t want you to let me out of your sight, but I just want to feel like I’m normal again even if it’s only for half an hour. Please?”
Frank ran a hand through his hair in frustration, the promise he’d made to his parents warring with the desire to see his brother acting like his old self, even if only for a little while. “Thirty minutes,” Frank said curtly, hating to be put in this position. “Then you’ll be right back here,” he pointed towards the spot where Callie and Vanessa were watching them nervously.
“Promise!” Joe nodded emphatically, practically bouncing with excitement. He quickly turned and started back to Vanessa, a huge grin on his face, when Frank grabbed his arm yanking him to a stop.
“If you’re even one second late…” Frank let the threat speak for itself.
“Thirty minutes,” Joe repeated, extricating himself from Frank’s grasp. “Not one second more.” Rushing to Vanessa’s side, he threw an arm around her and the two quickly disappeared into the darkness, heading for the barn.
Callie walked over to Frank and slid an arm around his waist. Dropping an arm across her shoulders, Frank sighed heavily. “Please tell me I did the right thing…”
*****
Joe held Vanessa’s hand tightly in his as they entered the barn. Looking around he saw a few other people wandering around but they seemed to have arrived at a ‘slow’ period. Letting his eyes adjust to the dimly lit interior, Joe glanced around, smiling when he saw a small doorway off to the side that seemed to be unused.
“This way,” he said to Vanessa, tugging on her hand.
“What’s back here?” Vanessa asked, tucking herself in close to Joe’s side.
“Hopefully… nothing,” Joe winked.
Leading Vanessa through two more doorways, he heard the voices of the few other occupants in the barn drifting away. As he hoped, they didn’t run into any of the actors who were supposed to scare unsuspecting visitors, leaving him fairly certain this part of the barn wasn’t officially part of the ‘tour’.
As they entered the rear of the barn, Joe found a stall filled with hay. With a final look around to make sure there was no one lying in wait to scare them, Joe turned to his girlfriend, who already knew what he had in mind. Smiling she wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed herself against him.
Eyeing Vanessa with a predatory gleam in his eye, Joe pulled her close and kissed her longingly. Feeling her melt in his arms, Joe pulled Vanessa down onto the soft cushion of hay…
Let the author know what you think of this story
Home Library Authors Rogue's Gallery Vehicles Chums Message Board Rap Sheet Links Contact
Disclaimer
The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The authors have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.