Lilly

“Oh my God,” Elyse exclaimed. “I can’t believe we haven’t noticed this before,” she continued.

“What?” Steve asked.

“It’s been right in front of us the whole time,” she said, but not explaining anything.

“What are you talking about?” Jake asked.

Rather than reply, she started going through files very rapidly, even doing searches through archived news reports. Finally, she sat up, and looked at the two men with her.

“She’s been telling us the truth. She can’t read our minds, at least I don’t think she can,” she told them.

“Then how do you explain the readings we’re getting from her?” Steve asked.

“She has telepathy alright, but not what we were looking for, or would have thought to look for,” she said. Both of them were clearly confused, but remained silent, staring at her, giving her the opportunity to explain. She turned the computer to them and let them watch an old news report.

“In an odd event today, it appears that a young girl has been rescued by, of all things, a lot of birds. According to witnesses, the young girl was apparently on the losing end of an altercation with a schoolmate, when a large flock of birds swooped down on the unsuspecting boy. Although the boy has received many cuts, school officials stated that there were no life threatening injuries. A number of local witnesses have posted recordings of the odd event on social media. One witness said he became aware of the incident when the girl let out what he described as a ‘horrific’ scream which prompted him to investigate,” the reporter said.

A recording then began playing, showing a black undulating mass, and a little distance away, a small girl sitting like a statue. Even in the grainy video, she looked almost white, and they could tell it was a much younger Priscilla.

“How old would you say she is there?” Steve asked, prompting Elyse to pause the video.

“Maybe five or six, considering she’s in school, but we could find out. What interests me is that she was rescued by a lot of birds. Kind of coincidental, don’t you think?” Elyse said, then resumed playing the video.

“The witness that recorded this particular video began recording only moments after coming on the scene. As you can see, the birds had already come to the girl’s rescue,” and he paused. Then, “Are those snakes beside the girl?” he asked, looking more closely at the video. “I think they are. My God, this was more serious than I thought. It’s amazing she wasn’t bitten,” he exclaimed.

He quickly regained his composure and looked to his side, where the camera brought into view a woman dressed in a business suit, with her light brown hair held in a bun. “With us today is premiere ornithologist, Dr. Natalie Havaland, from the University of Georgia.”

“Stan, it was already very serious. Those birds could have done real damage to the boy, or her if they had attacked her as well,” the woman beside him said.

“Dr. Havaland, is this kind of behavior normal?” he asked her.

“In all of my years studying raptors, and other birds, I have never witnessed anything like this. There have been cases of birds attacking humans, even a few in concert, such as the magpies in Australia, but this is unprecedented. I can count at least five different varieties of bird in that mass, and there may be more,” she replied.

“What could have caused them to attack like that?” he asked.

“Although this is completely conjecture, there is the possibility that her scream touched the right tone to evoke a defense instinct in the birds, although that is really a stretch. Each species would have a different vocal trigger. Birds tend not to come to the aid of other birds, even of their own species, and many not even in aid of their own young. And I can’t even speculate on the presence of the snakes you just noticed. I’d be curious what kind of snakes those are,” she said, then seemed to be looking closely at the small monitor beside her. “That’s a golden eagle that just swooped in. That boy is lucky he only received a bunch of cuts and scratches.”

“I guess it’s a bad idea to get that little girl mad at you,” the reporter said.

“That woman said that wasn’t normal behavior for birds, yet it happened”, Elyse said. She then brought up a second news clip.

“We have a sad story tonight. Casey Snow is our reporter on the scene. Casey, can you tell us what’s going on,” the news anchor began. An image of a somewhat lean woman appeared, with her hair in a braid that was hanging over her shoulder. Behind her was a mobile home that wasn’t in the best of condition. There was some small amount of junk scattered around, and a patio chair a short distance from the front door The camera managed to capture that police outline where someone had met their end.

“We’re in the Doraville mobile home park, where sometime after midnight last night, a young girl witnessed her mother die from an apparent drug overdose. As sad as that is, it is unfortunately not uncommon thanks to the opioid epidemic sweeping the nation. What is uncommon is that the mother’s boyfriend, stumbling away from the house, managed to step into a very large snake ball. According to reports, along with pictures taken before anyone could get near his body, there were at least a dozen different varieties of snakes slithering over him, an estimated total of at least 40 snakes, although it is nearly impossible to be certain. Experts have identified all three types of rattlesnake in Georgia, along with copperheads, water moccasins and a few non-venomous snakes, including king snakes. According to the experts, it is very unusual to find a mixed grouping of snakes like this, as several of these varieties consider the others food,” the onsite reporter told them.

“What a horrible way to go,” the female co-anchor said, giving an involuntary shiver, showing her apparent dislike of snakes.

“Glad I wasn’t him,” the news anchor said, in a somewhat miserable attempt to add some humor to the story.

“But that poor little girl. Her mother dies, and then the man who is probably as close to a dad as she has, stumbles into a snake ball,” the co-anchor said.

“Do we know anything about how the girl is doing,” the anchor asked.

“Of course, she’s a child, so any identifiable information is suppressed. However, we do know she is as alright as a child can be in the situation. She has been placed in emergency foster care, as no family has been identified yet, so she should be alright. A representative with the Department of Family and Children’s Services stated that they are working to find any family that could take her in,” the reporter replied, as they showed a picture of the snakes on the man’s body. Scrolling through several pictures, one picture had a nice closeup of Priscilla, younger than she was then, but older than the previous video.

“Is that the girl,” the co-anchor asked.

“Yes, that’s the girl. We do know the picture was posted on the internet by witnesses. It’s our understanding that DFCS is working to have them all removed, again to protect the child, and we will also remove it from future links to this report, at the request of DFCS,” the reporter said.

“So it appears that her only family has been taken from her,” the anchor noted, trying to steer away from the photos, which they probably shouldn’t have shown. Elyse was happy they had access to the original news clip, rather than just the edited version.

“It appears that way, John,” the reporter agreed, and Elyse turned it off.

“I know what you guys are going to say. Those reports don’t prove anything, and I agree, but along with these videos, look at her foster care reports,” she said, bringing that information on the screen.

There was a listing of 10 foster homes, each giving a final report, except the last one. “In 7 of the 10 homes she’s been in, there were reports of Priscilla being abused and the family pets attacking someone in the house. My belief is that the pet was defending her,” Elyse said.

“Add to that the reports from our CIA goons, not to mention the birds masking her, snakes being involved in some of the attempts to catch her, not to mention rats and dogs and other animals,” she said, using the term Lilly had used, “And a picture starts forming. It’s plain, if you care to see it. I can’t demonstrably prove it, but I know it’s true,” she said.

Jake was still skeptical, but Steve seemed to be thinking over that hypothesis, correlating it with his own experiences, along with the many reports of interactions with the girl.

“Wait, what about the incident at the high school, with all of those animals in the woods, making a wall around her?” she said, forming it like a question.

“My God,” Steve whispered.

“And the squirrel in our van just before she shot us. That’s how she opened the door,” Steve said, and Elyse nodded, knowing it was likely.

“Whether that’s right or not, she’s unmasked again,” Jake yelled out.

“Where?” Steve asked, already back in the driver’s seat.

“Northlake Mall,” Jake said.

The difference between the trio of technicians, primarily Elyse Goodwin, and the scientists at the lab, was that Elyse was working from a hunch and looking at reports and ground observations. She’d connected the dots from events, and history, and formed a picture of what was really going on. The scientists were analyzing monitor data. The scientists effort would take longer to reach any real understanding of what was happening.

However, they had realized that something wasn’t as it should be. They were just running the data through more analysis as the technicians arrived at Northlake Mall.