They moved closer to inspect the patients. Veronica slightly crouched towards one of the patients to hear what they were saying.
" He was right"
"Who's he ?"
"The dream felt better than life"
" They keep saying something about dreams" Jared said.
" That's what almost all of them say, about having happy dreams, the psychiatrist asked them what they meant but none gave a clear response." The nurse explained, veronica jotted down her words. Veronica turned and saw Zuri standing next to a woman on a stool beside a bed, grasping a man's hand as he laid there. She immediately recognized them as the couple her and Eniola saw earlier that day.
"Is he your husband ?" Zuri asked.
"Yes he is" the woman replied "I don't know what happened to him, one day he went missing, when I found him, he lost his memories, nothing seems to work. Is almost as if he's losing his sense of identity, to think this would happen while we're still in debt"
Zuri looked at him closely, sure enough, he looked like something has emptied him out from the inside. His eyes looked so hollow.
"How was his behavior before the day he disappeared ?"
The woman started narrating " Well, he's been going out a lot lately, whenever he returned home he looked content, I never said anything about it because I was glad he felt relieved for the first time but I couldn't shake off the feeling that something was off. Then one day he left the house and never came back, I have been looking for him since then and when I found him. He couldn't remember anything, I tried all manner of things to jog his memory but nothing worked."
Tears streamed down her cheeks, Zuri gave her a side hug, reassuring her that everything will soon be resolved. Finding no other leads, they left the hospital. Amare asked the DPO if he could get information on the families of the victims. The DPO handed him the file he had brought, having suspected they might request it, the DPO left, he needed to continue investigating on his end.
With the files in hand, the four of them visited the families listed. One family claimed that their daughter suffered from severe depression, suddenly their daughter started leaving the house often. She claimed she was going for "therapy sessions", they didn't stop her because she felt more alive but they always felt something was wrong. then one night their daughter left and didn't return; by the time the police found her she looked so lifeless.
another family said that their relative lost his job and became a shut-in. He refused to contact anyone saying he needed space. it went on for a month, when they went to check on him, he was gone. They have been looking for him for two weeks, when they did find him, he couldn't remember a single thing. A girl said her friend was a victim of cyber bullying and she became a shut-in, but she started going for therapy sessions. One day, she found out that her friend went missing, she told the police. By the time they found her, she had amnesia.
There was one thing in common with all their stories: one, the victims were going through one problem or the other, be it depression, bullying, harrassment etc; two, the victims went for "therapy sessions"but never stated who their therapist was.
The four–Amare, Jared, Zuri and Veronica went to a nearby café to try connecting the dots with the leads they have.
"One– the victims looked hollowed out" Zuri said.
Amare continued "they all said they had happy dreams, didn't say what they dreamt about, I overheard someone "he's right" they didn't say who "
Jared added "before the victims went missing, they went for therapy sessions. They never told anyone who their therapist was, their families seem to know something was off but brushed it off."
Veronica continued "the victims were going through one problem or the other. Also, there's a day they left and didn't come back, by the time they were found they already had amnesia. Well I wouldn't call it amnesia at this point."
Amare rubbed his temple " okay, that's all important clues, I don't think we're missing any. There are a lot of unanswered questions but the one bothering me is the identity of the therapist."
" Yes, it makes me wonder why the victims never said anything about the therapist to anyone" Zuri said.
" Who knows ? Maybe they were told not to or something made them not to tell, is possible that this therapist is the one responsible for this" Jared said.
""Yeah… I agree. Most of the families said they always felt something was off, but they never acted on it because the victims always seemed… content. But what if… what if they were slowly losing their memories even before they disappeared?" Veronica stated.
"If that were the case, wouldn't the people around them have noticed sooner? Look closer at the timeline—you'll see it actually took some time before they went missing. That period probably overlaps with their therapy sessions. Maybe… something was keeping them grounded, masking the memory loss so no one would notice until it was too late." Zuri said.
Just then, Amare's phone rang, it was the DPO. He left the table to take the call. Moments later he came back, his face lit up with a broad smile.
"Guys, the DPO said that they've just found a victim who still has some fragments of their memories."