The truth about Rose

It's been a few days since Rachel's mom Laura Jones returned. A mother she thought she had lost. And now Rachel eats meals with Laura and chats with her as if they didn't experience the loss of her and mourned for her for years!

Thoughts jumbled and tangled inside Rachel's mind like ropes caught in a messy storm. The presence of her mother was more bizarre than encountering a grotesque creature from the hell beneath the earth. The way her mother spoke, the strange tinge of sadness in her expression, that odd melancholy about her. During all the conversations Rachel had with her, she sensed the lifelessness in her presence. It was as if the lady named LauraJones had misplaced something vital inside her during the time she was away. It was as if she had lost her very soul. This disturbed Rachel deeply. But she couldn't press this on her dad knowing how much this confirmation of strangeness would hurt him. She felt it would be… almost inhumane.

Rachel remained mostly quiet and witnessed her father spending days with his long-lost wife. She studied their exchanges and the more she observed, that dreadful thought sank in more and more. But how could she warn that poor man? Tell him that his wife is not the person he thinks she is. Laura behaved just as another mother of the family would, yet Rachel could not ignore the mechanical coldness about her.

That strange mother was now sleeping downstairs with dad.

Thinking about her mom set her thoughts down the path where Rose walked beside that strange man. "I created her," said Dean. She was some sort of an android Dean had created. She was a person Rachel cared about. Yet there was some ulterior motive behind her being so close to Rachel. But what could it be? Dean asked for her aid in his venture over and over again even while she beat the living ghost out of him. Why would he be so interested in a small-town girl like her who's just trying to survive the day in this monster-infested cursed region? Many questions remained unanswered and they weighed on her mind until she was drowning in the sea of sleep.

Time flew by and the night grew dense. It was midnight when a faint and dry noise broke her slumber. Her sleepy eyes shot open. She felt distressed, trying to find the source of the sound by the glow of the moon that entered through the window. There was someone inside her room, sitting beside her reading table! The thought of a stranger in her bedroom snapped her back into the conscious world. She sat straight on her bed and tried to see who it was.

A sigh of relief escaped her breasts as she recognized the ever-familiar features of her dad sitting on the chair by the table. He was reading a book from the bluish light of the moon. His eyes were intently focused on its pages.

"Dad!" she gasped.

John Jones flinched and gaped at his daughter who was now sitting on the bed, eyeing him with shock.

"Oh, dear!" John exhaled as he tried to settle down, and barked, "You scared me, girl!"

"Me?!" protested Rachel, "You almost gave me a heart attack, dad! What are you doing here in the middle of the night?"

"Oh dear, I didn't mean to," said John apologetically. After a moment of silence, he said quietly, "I was struggling to make up my mind. Trying to decide whether or not I should wake you… to have a much-needed conversation."

Rachel heard the deep tone of despair in his voice. A pang of pain slashed her heart anticipating what it was all about. But she steadied herself and tried to shake the sleepiness away.

Dad finally came to his senses! she told herself hopefully.

"So, I… I've been thinking about Rose Graham," dad said as he peered at her from behind the book. "Her circumstances give a lot of insight into this situation." Dad put his book down on the table and sighed heavily. "I mean… to your mother's situation."

"What I'm about to tell you might come as a shock to you," said dad, looking straight into her eyes. "Although, I have a sneaking suspicion that you already anticipated as much. Anyway, I've contacted some of my old friends, people who still owed me favors. And I've managed to dig up all the information I could find about Rose. And from the information that I was sent, it would appear that she is listed as 'died in a car accident'; which happened about five years ago."

"What!" Rachel inhaled sharply as her hand automatically clenched the sheet of her bed for support.

"I know. I know." Nodded John in understanding. "I know exactly how you feel. To be honest with you," he said as he looked down at his palms. His face was partially hidden under dark shadows against the moonlight. "I wish I didn't go looking for all that crap. I wish I had just buried my head in the sand and made peace with the blessing for the fact that your mother still lives."

Rachel could not speak and only stared at her father in unadulterated horror. Dreading the words that he was about to utter next.

John looked directly into his daughter's eyes and said, "That bastard Dean is taking near-dead patients and turning them into androids. Robots with mechanical bodies and a human brain!"