05 - Changeling

by Chris Kubasik - (ebook by Undead)

  “I don’t know that it will work. And I don’t think I could do it without you wanting me to.”

  “Tox!”

  “Listen!” Peter pointed a massive finger at Breena. “I changed. I know what it’s like. I didn’t get something extra. I used to be part of society. I had a place. I knew where I was, where I belonged. You cannot begrudge me my desire to get that back! I’m not what I was.” He pronounced the last words with particular emphasis. “You cannot begrudge my desire.”

  “No,” she said softly. “You are a troll. You know this, Profezzur. No one could have figured out everything you have and not see the truth. You are a troll. Magic is back, and you are a creature of fantasy…”

  “Don’t try to make it sound wondrous!”

  “It is! The world is getting jolted out of its complacency. Slowly, but it’s happening. All the rules are flipped. Which gives us a chance to write new rules, and the new rules might be better.”

  “And in the meantime, I’m…” He could hear the self-pity about to come out of him, and hated himself for it. “Never mind. It may seem wondrous to you. But to me it’s already mundane. It’s just me, stuck in the wrong body.”

  “You sure talk good for a troll,” said Liaison, an impressed look in her eyes.

  “Thanks,” said Peter drily.

  “Next step?” Breena said, changing the topic abruptly.

  Peter looked around the room. “We’ve got to get into ABTech, see what they’ve got. See if they can help me. See if they can work the operation for Kathryn. See if Dr. Clarris is there.”

  “Even if they can, they’re not going to let her in.”

  “That’s the next step. If they can do it, we’ll sneak her in. We’ll disguise her or something. Whatever. We’ll make it happen.”

  “Not without getting in there and casing the joint.”

  “That would help. But we don’t have to do it that way.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We know that they take women into the lab and work on them. Liaison, could you get into their records and set it up so that Kathryn was already on their list? She could simply show up, get the operation, and walk back out again.”

  “That’s good,” said Breena, duly impressed. “That’s so ridiculously unexpected. You seem to have found your niche.”

  “Well,” said Liaison, “I don’t want to short-sell my abilities, but operations conducted from only the Matrix make me nervous. It’s always better to have someone on-site. And I think we should case the place first. That way, we don’t hit any surprises.” She put her hand on Kathryn’s. “Sending you in there alone, with no research. I don’t like that.”

  “Going in astrally is out. With the drek you describe going on in that place, any magic around AB-Tech is going to be totally slotted up. No mage in his right mind would hang out there. The etheric media has to be awfully distorted by the kind of experiments they’re doing. Going in astrally would be like asking for a nightmare.”

  Peter realized that he’d avoided looking at Kathryn since things had become tense with Breena. When he did glance over, he saw her lost in thought. It looked as if she’d checked out of the conversation some time back. What was she thinking? “I should go in first. To check it out,” he said.

  “Sounds good to me. You know the stuff better than the rest of us. You can go mingle and find out what’s what.”

  “Wait a minute. I meant I’d be invisible or something. Like you did for Liaison.”

  “Still looking for that kiss?” laughed Liaison.

  Breena ignored her. “That won’t make it worth the time. We’ll dress you up and send you in to talk to these folks. Leez, can you get back into Geneering. and this time just rifle through the employee records?”

  “Sure, null sweat.”

  “Do you speak French?”

  “No,” Peter said, confused.

  “All right. Leez? Picture, ID codes, and such. Get me someone over there from North America.”

  “Click.”

  “Breena, I hate to burn your screen, but I’m a troll. I know there are no trolls in the industrial sciences. I looked for them. There’s no way I’m going to pass for someone who belongs to ABTech.”

  “Oh, yes you will. What you are forgetting, Profezzur, is that magic exists. It’s in me, it’s in you. And with it we can do wonders with your image.”

  “We’ll need more muscle,” said Liaison.

  “I don’t want to do it,” Kathryn said.

  “What?” Now it was Breena and Peter talking almost in unison.

  “It’s off. I don’t want to go in. I don’t want to…” She looked ill and stumbled out of the kitchen down the hall. Peter got up and followed her, but stopped abruptly when she went through a door marked Women. After a moment he heard the sounds of retching. Liaison had come out into the hall. She was standing by the kitchen, concern etched on her face. Peter waited another moment, then pushed the bathroom door open.

  It was a typical office bathroom, large, filled with sinks and stalls, the same as the one he’d used at the other end of the apartment, but this one had rose-colored tiles. He saw Kathryn kneeling on the floor of the first stall. He grabbed a wad of paper towels from a countertop on the way to the stall. She was breathing heavily, her hands pressed against the rose-colored metal of the stall. He leaned down and let her see the handful of towels. She was startled for a moment, but then took them and cleaned her face.

  She tried to get up. Peter took her arm, carefully, and helped her.

  “Thank you,” she said, her gaze averted.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I just… Sometimes I don’t feel well.”

  “You’re pregnant.”

  “There’s that.” She laughed harshly, and added, “But sometimes I don’t make myself feel too well.” Peter felt uncomfortable, as if he’d stumbled onto a private conversation she often had with herself. He backed away, getting ready to leave. “Why do you think those women do that?” she said.

  “Sell the fetuses?”

  “Yes.”

  “I… I think they think they have no choice.”

  Kathryn nodded. “I had choices. I was still going to sell my baby. Breena’s right.”

  Peter was confused. “No. You…”

  “Yes. I gave in.” She balled her hand into a fist and slammed it into the wall of the stall. Her jaw was clenched tightly and her eyes shone with a thin film of moisture. “I can’t…” she said, and gasped for air. “I can’t believe myself. It’s like… I was using my son…”

  Peter didn’t know what she meant. She saw his confusion, and smiled a malevolent smile that carried and revealed pain. She raised her arms to him. The images of the holos at her house flashed into his mind. “When I was a girl I starved myself. Anorexia. Anorexia nervosa, for the pros.” Peter tried to keep his memory of the holos from showing on his face. “I was a control freak with the stamina of a teenager. Ever hear of it?”

  “Eating disorder,” Peter said flatly.

  “Yes,” she said harshly, “but oh, so much, much more. To see the problem in terms of eating is to simply scratch the surface. That’s the symptom. The disease… The disease… The disease is control. To master the one thing in your life you have control of. Your body. There was so much wrong happening in my life then… My mother—” She cut herself off and changed the subject. “People think, even I did, it was about weight, about beauty. It isn’t.”

  She began to pace back and forth across the tiled floor. “It’s about saying, ‘I will control what I eat, what I look like, how I behave. The world is swirling around me, out of control, but I have this. I am master of my physical form.’” She stopped and rested her hands against a sink, looked at her face in the mirror. Her voice became raspy, unearthly. “You can die of control. You can master your body so well you just die. Perfect control. Nothing left to go wrong.”

  She brought her palms up to her face and slapped herself. Peter took two quick steps tow
ard her, but Kathryn held her hands out, stopping him. Her flesh burned red where she had struck herself.

  “You know what I want to do?” She didn’t wait for a reply. “I want to abort the baby. I want to get rid of it.” Her chin began to tremble. “I want to forget John, too. I just want it all forgotten.” She stepped back and leaned against the wall. “I mean, look at me. Am I a mother?”

  She looked terrible. Peter didn’t want to answer.

  “Don’t tell me. Because it doesn’t matter what you say.” She wiped the backs of her hands against her eyes to dry them. “Because I’m not going to abort my son. That’s too easy. That’s the coward’s way out. For me. For me right now. That’d be shedding weight to feel like I was in control. I’m not fourteen, I’m not Breena living without money on the streets. I want this baby. I want John’s son. I let myself get out of control with John, and I want to keep the lack of control with our son.” She touched her hands to her belly. “I wanted the best for him. The best isn’t perfection. The best is him.” She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. “Peter?”

  “Kathryn?”

  Her eyes still closed, she said, “How long does it take to feel all right? I’ve never felt all right. Most people don’t know it, but I don’t feel all right.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t feel too good myself. I’m a troll.”

  She opened her eyes and smiled at him. “That’s right. You are. But don’t count yourself out yet.” She closed her eyes again. “Does it take a lifetime? Or do we just never feel all right? Do some of us just muddle through?”

  “I think some of us muddle. You don’t seem like a muddler, though.”

  “Control, Peter. Control. It cuts both ways.” She rubbed her right hand against her forehead. “Control. Spirits! How am I going to get my company back? Now that I’ve given up my quest, going back to a nice place to work and a nice home seems like a damned good idea.”

  The door to the bathroom slammed open. Breena stood in the doorway, her face a tight mask of indignation. “Prof? Your friend? Your chummer? Your pal? He’s gone.”

  29

  Breena said, “Oh, I knew…” under her breath as she led Peter down the hall to the front door. She shouted over her shoulder, “Leez, stay with the Red.”

  No lights lit the deserted halls. Feeling his way along the corridor, Peter pressed one hand against the wall. He moved slowly, because old filing cabinets and shattered computer monitors littered the floor, and all were cool and the same temperature.

  “Wait,” said Breena. From her pocket she pulled a ring that emitted light, then slipped it on a finger.

  He heard quick footsteps echo up from the stairwell. “Come on.”

  They ran for the stairs. When they reached the landing, Peter looked down the center of the well and saw Eddy’s trembling warm-red hand sliding along the banister.

  “Eddy, come back here. What are you doing?”

  Eddy didn’t answer, but kept moving.

  Peter bounded down the stairs, with Breena close behind. Realizing he didn’t have his gun, he was glad. At this point he’d have felt obliged to shoot Eddy down, something he didn’t really want to do.

  When Peter got to me first floor, he saw Eddy run through the lobby toward me front door.

  “Eddy! Stop or I’ll shoot!” he shouted.

  Still running, Eddy called back. “No, Peter, don’t. You don’t understand.”

  Brenna came up alongside Peter, her breathing ragged and loud. “Where’s your gun?”

  “Don’t have it on me.”

  She faltered and lost her stride. “Son of a fragging insect.”

  Peter ran on.

  Eddy had just reached the building’s outer doors. A red glow grew behind Peter. When he looked back, Breena was forming a fireball in her hands, the heat of the object nearly blinding him. For one instant he drought about leaping in front of it to save Eddy. But then he remembered that the man just couldn’t be trusted.

  He dove for the ground.

  The shadows in the lobby slid quickly across me walls as the fireball rushed toward the doorway. Sensing danger, Eddy glanced over his shoulder, his mouth forming into a twisted, terrified O. He jumped through the doorway out onto the sidewalk, just as the fireball slammed into me metal frame of the doors and exploded. Shattering into bits of fire, it flew in all directions.

  Peter heard Eddy scream. He scrambled up and saw his friend on the ground, rolling desperately back and forth in the snow, his pants and the back of his jacket on fire.

  Peter rushed through the lobby. Eddy’s screams grew in intensity, and now he was clawing at his hair and his face, frantically trying to beat out the flames.

  Suddenly Peter saw red bodies rush toward Eddy from out of the darkness of the street. At first he thought they might be ghouls or scavengers, but then saw they were only mobmen dressed in dark overcoats. One man spotted Peter and their eyes met. The hood smiled, just slightly, and drew an Uzi III from under his jacket.

  Peter stopped running, slid for a meter or so along the smooth, marble floor, and then ran back into the lobby. Bullets raced along the wall behind him. He only caught a glimpse of the other hood, who had whipped off his overcoat and was using it to beat out the flames on Eddy.

  He saw Breena rush toward him, her face set and furious. He dove at her, catching her in the crook of his right arm as he fell to me ground. Bullets smashed into the ground all around them. Peter twisted and rolled to put himself between me mobster and Breena. Two bullets smacked into his shoulder, sending a dull pain spreading through him. Breena’s ring lay on the floor, illuminating them clearly. Peter reached out and grabbed it, plunging the lobby into darkness.

  Outside he heard some shouting in Japanese, and caught the words “now,” “orders,” and “later.” He looked toward the doors and saw that the mobman had left.

  “Get your fragging arm off of me,” Breena said with a coldness that frightened Peter. He rolled over and ran toward the doorway, leaving the ring with her.

  Outside he saw the two hoods shoving Eddy into a sleek black Westwind.

  “Son of a—”

  Peter crouched and scuttled off toward the car, using the burnt-out bodies of other cars for cover. He was just across the street when the Westwind began to accelerate. Peter made a dash for it, running up behind and jumping onto the top. He heard muffled shouts of surprise from within the car as the impact of his body on the roof rocked it from one side to the other.

  Peter swung his fist and smashed it through the windshield. As the Westwind swerved wildly, he grabbed the roof edge and clung to it tightly.

  Eddy shouted, “Peter, Peter, don’t… don’t do it. It’s clear, it’s clear!”

  Then four bullets punched their way through the left side of the Westwind’s roof. Peter immediately rolled over the bullet holes and watched with nervous excitement as four more bullets shot out in the spot where he had just been.

  Peter glanced around and saw that they were approaching the Michigan Avenue bridge over the Chicago River.

  He rolled back over to the left and smashed his fist through the driver’s door window. The Westwind once again swerved wildly, this time grinding up against the bridge’s cement guard rail.

  Peter wiggled his hand around trying to contact the head, neck, or shoulders of the driver. Suddenly he felt his nails dig into the man’s face. The driver screamed, and the car accelerated. It careened toward the left side of the bridge, rushing into the guard rail at a tremendous speed.

  Peter flew off the car and into the air over the river. The car flipped over the railing and followed.

  He had nothing to which he might compare the sensation. He felt weightless, for he could not feel his body pressing against anything, but at the same time he was being drawn to the cold, ice-filled river below. He was Alice falling down the rabbit hole. He remembered it now. Alice didn’t rush down the hole, she took her time. She looked at things along the way. She didn’t focus on the certain destructi
on waiting for her below. It was enough for her to be falling. The result was inevitable. She didn’t panic about it.

  It was a strange thought to be having at this moment.

  Then he plunged into the icy water, the sounds of the world muffling into a dull roar. The water rushed by him as Peter dropped deeper and deeper. Within seconds he could see nothing.

  A panic coiled around his body. Which way was up? He twisted around, only now aware that he hadn’t held his breath as he plunged into the water.

  He let his whole body relax, the weight of his skin, his clothes, his shoes dragging him down. He discovered that what he had thought was up was really off to one side. He turned himself so his feet pointed down.

  Then he started swimming up, keeping his head as a guide.

  His lungs burned. He wanted desperately to take in a breath of air. With difficulty he forced his mouth to stay shut.

  Only a little more, he told himself. Only a little more. But he had no idea how much further it would be. He had no idea how deep he had sunk. He could see no light ahead of him.

  His arms strained. Just a little more.

  How much little more?

  Don’t give up.

  He couldn’t stand not breathing anymore. He just wanted to take in big gulps of air, to breathe and never sop breathing.

  He pleaded with himself not to try to breathe—not just yet. Just a little bit more. That’s all he wanted. Just a little bit further and he could finally breathe.

  Before he knew he’d arrived, his hands broke the surface of the water. His head followed, and he gulped down one quick breath of air after another. Thick slabs of ice floated around him and bumped against his body, but he didn’t mind.

  “Peter!” Eddy cried.

  Bullets splashed into the water around Peter. He gulped down some more air and dove underwater again to escape another round of bullets slashing through me water. He turned and swam in the direction from which they’d come.

  Peter had gone perhaps ten meters when his hand bumped into a body.

  He surfaced and came face to face with one of the mobsters. The man’s teeth chattered as he tried to bring his gun around to Peter, but Peter punched him in the jaw. It was enough to send the hood into shock. He slipped down into the water.