Strange Flesh

by Michael Olson

  The low, rumbling cackle that boils into my ear when I pick up does nothing to soothe my nerves.

  She says, “Have we found one who seeks to burn?”

  I say, “Yes.”

  “And can you keep the Secrets of our Order on pain of death?”

  “Yes.”

  She continues. “You have studied the Book. Now write your own chapter. Innoculytes must withstand the full Course of their Fever over the Month of Purging. You must commit five crimes for each Degree until you’re consumed. You will begin with a confession in the chapel. Do you accept this charge?”

  Rushing to jot down what I just heard, I mutter, “Yes, I accept the charge.”

  The line goes dead.

  That exchange removes any doubt that Billy’s set up Château de Silling as a virtual recruiting post for the Pyrexians. I guess the “Course of Fever” Madame Desgranges mentioned is a series of trials one must undertake to gain membership. Our puppet master probably planted the rumors about the Pyros to begin with. So is he trying to import this legend into reality, using his game to actually create a lodge of risqué Rotarians to do his bidding?

  Seeing that the first step toward initiation is ready to roll, I suppose I’ll find out soon enough. Silling’s chapel now boasts a series of previously hidden confessionals. Once inside, my voice-chat indicator lights up, and the Duke’s voice says, “We’re listening.”

  I sit there for a moment hesitating about what exactly I’m supposed to confess. Finally, I load a voice-processing program and improvise an overwrought tale about an unusually solicitous assistant football coach and a secret place underneath the bleachers.

  A sickly giggle sound effect plays. Then the Duke says, “We are pleased. You are getting warmer.”

  Well, that was simple . . . if somewhat horrifying.

  As I leave the booth, I notice that now a key is hung over the handle of the opposite side, where the priest would normally sit to hear his parishioners. I take it into inventory and then see that it opens all the doors on the row. I step into one of the other booths and immediately hear someone else reciting his census of sins. This one is about the speaker’s recent tryst with his brother-in-law, and unlike most confessions, there’s no note of repentance in his tone.

  So recording my first “crime” gives me access to the submissions of my fellow players.

  I have root on Billy’s server, so I dig around until I find a few videos that look like they might represent more advanced crimes. The associated note cards tell me that the game’s next step requires a live video of oneself engaging in a “solitary passion.” The third demands a video of you perpetrating an “outrage” upon someone else. The first entry I find in this category is a video of a Japanese string bondage enthusiast delivering a lecture about the virtues of the Kikkou style over the Hishi while he ties an intricate pattern of cords over his “victim.” I suspect he’ll have to try again.

  But others have done better.

  The next one I check, entitled Embroidering Celadon, queues up a piquer fetish video: an adolescent boy having a wide variety of needles and other sharp objects jabbed into his buttocks. Mild examples of this genre resemble a naughty version of acupuncture. But given the array of instruments laid out on the table beside the kid, I doubt his vital energy is about to be rebalanced. More like the opposite.

  I shut it off.

  So Billy’s warped hazing program has appropriated the “storytelling” mechanism of 120 Days. It also shares elements of most pornographic file-swapping rings. You show me yours, I’ll show you mine. The quality of the content you submit determines your privileges within the group.

  But that’s the first video I’ve seen in Silling that seems like it might end on the far side of the law. Of course, fetish filmmakers master the craft of making adult actors appear underage. And much can be done to maximize the apparent savagery of the action. Have these videos been constructed to seem worse than they are? Does Billy even care?

  He can’t be too worried. The Degrees feel designed to channel players along the Sadean progression of ever-greater horrors, like future serial killers mutilating their first cats. As Sade says:

  The more pleasure you seek in the depths of crime, the more frightful the crime must be.

  35

  Given the violence endemic to imaginary worlds, having placed myself on a giant game board with an army of demented Sade obsessives leaves me feeling unsettled. I’m not sure what the rest of the iTeam knows about Billy’s game, but they’ve clearly learned enough from their GAME colleagues to make them uneasy as well. We’re sequestered in our usual booth at Foo Bar, supposedly for a meeting, but in light of three quickly slugged rounds, it seems we’ve opted for pickling our anxieties over trying to work through them.

  Even Olya, normally our productivity zealot, seems withdrawn. Watchful.

  I join her in scanning the oddly boisterous Sunday night crowd. A cluster of progs from a social gaming start-up are downing shots in series and high-fiving each other. The spectacle screams “Series B round just came through.” The organic-looking couple in the booth next to ours is alternately chugging beer and making out, like high school lovers who’ve ditched their chaperones.

  At the bar, I notice three men sipping tequila who seem to be trying particularly hard to conceal their interest in our table. Two of them could be brothers, both with five o’clock shadow and similar spiky black hair. One wears a tight gray ski sweater with a red scarf, and the other a navy blazer and pink Thomas Pink button-down. With them stands a swarthy giant with unruly curls hanging down to the collar of a loud glen-plaid suit. I see that the bartender is watching us too. And the DJ. Stop it. They’re just admiring Olya’s generous neckline.

  Garriott’s expounding on the thespian qualities of his favorite Fuckingmachines.com starlets, but I’m distracted when Xan gets up to refresh her drink. She reaches over the bar to signal our waitress, and that’s when Pinky puts his hand on her shoulder.

  I pop up instantly.

  Xan starts at the contact and spins to face him. He leans in to say something, a sly smile on his face. Then the scarf-swaddled guy pulls a small digital camera out of his pants pocket.

  I surge forward, pushing roughly through a knot of people, and grab Pinky by his lapels.

  “Whatever the fuck you think you’re doing, you better stop right now.”

  “Hey!” He jerks back awkwardly against the bar. Scarf grabs my wrist, trying to remove my hold on his friend. Plaid Suit steps around behind us to wrestle me away.

  Olya’s shoulder slams into Plaid Suit. She shoves her forearm across the neck of the guy holding me. “Get away from her!”

  At first, her victims seem disposed to resist, but Olya’s dazzling figure produces a severe primal confusion.

  Pinky sputters, “What—what’s your problem, man?”

  “Whatever you sick bitches are planning, why don’t you try it on me?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  I lean forward, renewing my grip. “Don’t—” Xan’s hand touches my arm.

  Pinky says, “Look, psycho, I was just asking if she’d take a picture of us. It’s my goddamn birthday.”

  I glance back at Xan. She nods.

  “Guys, I guess I made a mistake. I’m sorry. Hey, ah, next round’s on—”

  They’re not to be soothed. Plaid Suit shifts his bulk toward me and says, “Fuck you. Who the fuck do you think—”

  Olya presses against him. “Eh, eh, eh. Maybe you let me buy you the drink. We don’t mean—”

  I don’t hear the rest of her glamouring them because I’m thrown off by a movement in my peripheral vision. Back at our table, the guy that was sitting in the adjacent booth now stands in front of Garriott, shaking his hand. He puts his other hand on Garriott’s shoulder and gestures at his date, who reaches over the back of the booth to greet him as well. The guy doesn’t let go of his shoulder and bends down to say something else. I take a step toward them, not knowing ex
actly why.

  Pinky grabs my elbow, evidently not done with our confrontation.

  The woman next to Garriott raises her right hand. I’m horrified to see that her fist holds a steak knife. I try to yank my arm free, but Pinky’s grip is tight. I call Garriott’s name.

  He can’t hear me over the loud music. The woman cocks her hand, and anticipating the blow to follow, I set myself and twist my arm forward, breaking Pinky’s grasp.

  Too late, I think.

  But then something strange happens. Instead of plunging the knife into Garriott, the woman pulls it back toward her own face.

  And sticks the blunt handle all the way down her throat.

  The resulting reflex delivers in one gushing eruption all four pints of beer she had consumed earlier, along with a full plate of macerated nachos and what might be a Greek salad. Garriott reels back in disgust as her partner lets go.

  Another guy videos the incident from across the room. Rather than thoughts of vengeance, what enters my head is this simple observation:

  Day 6, scene 3.

  Olya gets there before me, and retribution is foremost in her mind. She stiff-arms the girl’s head into the wall and then bashes the meat of her palm onto her nose.

  In a low growl she says, “You stupid—”

  I reach out to restrain her, thinking that nobody’s really gotten hurt—yet. We can’t have Olya getting arrested in a bar brawl. Unfortunately, the boyfriend also decides to wade in. I elbow him in the gut and jack him back away from the booth. Garriott composes himself by wiping his face with the corner of our tablecloth. He bears an oddly philosophical expression, like he’s more disappointed than aghast.

  I try to drag Olya off the girl, though she’s literally spitting with rage. Just as I finally get them separated, I feel a hard jerk across my windpipe and am neatly ripped off my feet by someone with the physique of a bulldozer.

  He says, “Not cool, James.”

  That would be Ray the bouncer, a former heavyweight wrestler. He hauls me fast through the door and hurls me, without undue rancor, into the gutter. As I lie there catching my breath, I see another bouncer politely but firmly escorting Olya out by her elbow. Garriott and Xan follow, upbraiding the bar manager on the way.

  When I finally sit up, the Foo Bar staff has gone back in to deal with the other parties, though I imagine they’ve slunk out the back.

  Xan kneels at my side and asks, “Are you quite all right, James?”

  “Yeah, nothing a few more drinks won’t cure.”

  Olya fumes, muttering to herself in Russian, no doubt detailing the hideous fate she has in mind for Billy. I could direct her to a few choice passages in Sade.

  I edge upwind of Garriott. “You, ah, okay? That was pretty . . .”

  Garriott musters the proper devil-may-care affect. “That? A little Roman shower? That’s nothing, mate. I was a Wyvern at Cambridge, for God’s sake. Not to say that’ll stop me from pounding Billy’s face into marmalade, if he ever has the stones to show it.”

  I’m glad Garriott can laugh it off, but Olya may well have broken that girl’s nose.

  And the Innoculytes are just warming up.

  36

  The next day I walk back from the corner deli through the icy morning sipping a cup of burnt, acidic coffee. It’s not helping my tender head, which was already throbbing when I awoke. From my hard landing in the gutter last night? Or the unreasonable amount of Garriott’s favorite Bordeaux we drank after escorting him home to change? I guess the group wasn’t keen on traveling back to our respective apartments alone, because we tacitly decided to make a slumber party of it.

  So this morning I’m exhausted and yet still anxious to get back to GAME and power through the bugs we left for today.

  This intense impulse to resume work is alien to me. Am I feeling the first twinges of severe Stockholm syndrome? Maybe I need to take measures to get my personal shit together. Tamp down the Byronic passions I’m starting to feel for this tarted-up vacuum cleaner. Not to mention my paternal pride at seeing Fred make Xan or Olya go breathless.

  On the other hand, the life I led before was tending toward the untenable. I was engaged in my work without being inspired. And my personal life after Erica resembled a speeding car in heavy fog.

  At GAME, I’ve stumbled onto a project uniquely suited to my abilities and desires. Regardless of my qualms about the enterprise, in the past week or so, I’ve gone to work every day with a hard-on. Why? It’s the difference between doing something and building something. While they’re hard-won and all too rare, those flashes of triumphant creation satisfy like nothing else.

  In combining them with the primordial lust I feel toward Olya—despite her obvious entanglement with the very target of my investigation—I’ve found myself creating a false identity I like better than the original.

  Billy would be proud. Though when my job is done, I’m sure he’ll want to see me bleeding in the more literal sense.

  37

  If Blake’s SoHo spread seeks to frame its occupant with a discerning luxury, then Blythe’s is much more of the “tremble now, all ye who come before me” variety. The very existence of a suite consisting of the top four stories of a seventies–and–Central Park West monolith testifies to an owner who controls things the rest of us don’t even know about. I assume that’s the message intended by this gym-sized foyer with carved-marble wing staircases sweeping upward toward an actual ballroom. The décor betrays an interior designer who recently visited Versailles and takes too much Xanax with her kir royales.

  Not at all what I’d pictured for Blythe, something she acknowledges as she leads me into a cozy library for our meeting.

  “Sorry about the place. I know it’s gauche, but my stepmother forced it on my poor father when he was in no position to resist. She made him move to get away from his ‘old life’ in L.A., and all his stuff is still here. I know he was supposedly a corporate Antichrist, but a girl can still love her father, right?”

  “No shame in loving a prewar penthouse either.”

  “I promise myself that one day I’ll fill it with African war orphans to even the karma.”

  “I’m sure the co-op board will be thrilled.”

  Blythe had called me to ask if I could “swing by her place for a quick chat.” It was eleven PM then, now almost midnight, and something in her voice made me believe she might be a little drunk. An exciting prospect.

  The last time I’d seen Blythe get truly hammered was the night after I took her out of the Zeta house. The night she came by my apartment for a drink. The night, it is sad to say, that still stands as the clear apex of my life.

  We’d powered through most of a bottle sitting close on my couch. Though at first she wasn’t inclined to discuss it, after her third double, I brought the conversation around to the events of the previous night. I detailed my thoughts about exacting revenge on Novak, but she barely seemed interested, as though she’d already dismissed him from her mind.

  “You’re not angry?” I asked.

  “Of course. But mostly at myself.”

  “Blythe, you can’t blame—”

  She puts up her hands. “James, I knew.”

  “What?”

  “I knew all about Pete Novak. I knew his interest in me was . . . profane. It sounds so crazy, but I guess I wanted to see . . . Well anyway I never suspected he’d resort to such a cowardly cliché. I mean, a roofie? It makes no sense. The way he looked at me . . .”

  She trailed off and stared contemplatively into space. I tried to survey the void with her while she collected her thoughts. But when I glanced back, I found myself transfixed by those unearthly green eyes.

  “Was nothing like the way you look at me, James.”

  I racked my brain for something to say, but it had thrown a rod and juddered to a halt.

  Blythe rose. I feared she was leaving, but she merely bent to pick up Novak’s camera from my coffee table. She sat back down and regarded it thoughtfully.
>
  I cleared my throat, but before I could speak, she said, “I want you to take my picture, James. I want to see what you see.”

  She offered me the camera. Her hand lingered on it before she let it go, the gesture saying to me, “I know I can trust you. That you’d never try to hurt me.”

  The images I made that night became for a long time the holy icons of my private cult, the same ones that years later drove away my fiancée:

  A close-up of her glimmering eyes seeking mine through the lens.

  A slightly tilted shot, from my shiver of excitement when she touched the first button of her blouse.

  A profile of her lithe frame as she undid the front clasp of her bra.

  A dark silhouette of her matchless figure as she leaned over me and undid my fly.

  An extreme close-up of the appreciative quirk of her lips as she drew me out.

  An unfocused picture of the ceiling that corresponds to my burst hydrant of a climax.

  The curves at the small of her back as she rubbed her naked chest wetly against me.

  A lascivious grin over her shoulder as she led me by the hand into my bedroom. Her body bare, but for those red pearls.

  That was when I dropped the camera. It would never take another picture. But the memory survived.

  Once inside her, my eyes snapped shut as I tried to parse the symphony of sensation played by her gently rocking hips. She smelled like the final dish of a twelve-course tasting menu. Some concentrated essence of citrus and vanilla cream that the chef had to consult a battery of chemists to concoct.

  She grabbed my chin and said, “No. Keep looking at me, James.”

  I’d fantasized about sleeping with Blythe for more man-hours than they were wasting on the Big Dig. But I’d never imagined that the actual act could be better than all my fervid scenarios. Blythe was so in tune with herself, she was even able to make something of my amateur fumbling. She moved like she was a secret weapon the palace eunuchs trot out when the sexually ambivalent young sultan must produce an heir. Being a realist, I’m suspicious of over-the-top carrying on, but when Blythe subsided onto my chest with a self-conscious giggle and then bit my shoulder, I was so besotted I had to fight back tears.