by Mallory Kane
"Dessert." She smiled at her joke. The narcotic and the antinauseant would let him sleep for a while and would relieve some of the pain from his bruised ribs. Later when he woke, maybe she could find out some information about him—who he was, how he'd been hurt, why he was so afraid.
She sat down in the chair beside him and dozed.
#
Rider Savage felt better than he had in years, maybe in his whole life. He was floating on a cool cloud high above the earth where nothing could reach him, nothing could hurt him. He liked it up here. He felt clean and new, a part of the cloud.
Here there were no wire leads feeding him hours of detailed history about the Deviants, those twisted quasi-humans who called themselves skipworths. The computers had fed him more information than he'd ever wanted to know how Deviants could get inside your head and suck out your soul, how they burned out the brains of children if they got close enough, how they were plotting to take over the world and kill everyone who wasn't one of them.
But something was wrong. Something didn't belong. With a wrenching lurch of his heart that sent adrenalin pounding through his veins, he realized what it was.
Feelings. He wasn't supposed to have feelings. He was a killing machine, intent only on one objective—to search out the one person who was responsible for the Deviants. It was his only purpose, and a cold, killing hatred was his only emotion. It was why they called them tanks, a play on the acronym TAINCC. Tanks from the TAINCC.
He eased slowly toward consciousness, testing the space around him with his trained senses, trying to figure out where he was. The place was bright and dry, so it wasn't the alley.
It wasn’t heaven either, but it wasn't the slimy, unyielding tangle of leads and wires that made up the Total Acclimation and Immersion Neuro-physiological Conditioning Chamber. The TAINCC, where he'd left the last of his feelings and all of his memories.
He'd exchanged them for the cold hatred that would allow him to accomplish his mission—this mission he'd volunteered for, this mission to find and kill the woman whose progeny had destroyed his life.
He was an emotionless machine, programmed to kill. So why was he shivering with fear, burning with anger, and why was there a deep, almost familiar sensation inside him that he couldn't quite identify?
Wincing at the shock of pain his movement caused, Rider thought of the last conditioning session. That time, instead of sucking out his memories, the grueling seventy-two hour session had imbedded in him the information he'd needed to accomplish his mission, to eliminate his target.
Then before he'd even had a chance to recover from the trauma, he'd been hurled through a dark, eerie tunnel—a journey so bizarre, so frightening, it still made him cramp with nausea to remember it.
At the end of the tunnel, he'd slammed joltingly into a solid wall. He thought he had died. When he was able to move, agony shrieking through every muscle, breath stolen by the stabbing in his ribs and the pain in his head, he'd wished for death.
Everything had been cloaked in darkness. He hadn't been able to get a grip on reality, hadn't been able to move and breathe at the same time. Even his hatred for the Deviants, which he'd counted on to sustain him through this suicide mission, hadn't helped. All he could do was lie there, racked with pain, shrouded with helpless anger.
When he'd finally been able to form coherent thoughts and see without everything swimming around, he hadn't recognized anything. Wherever he'd landed, it was a dismal, earthy place, totally unlike the stark whiteness of the TAINCC. Odors and sounds assaulted senses made raw by pain. The nauseating smell of rotting flesh, the grating, irritating sound of shoes crunching on asphalt, the murmur of machines humming all around him. Stones and grit bit into his face and his palms. Cold seeped into his bones like water into a dry sponge.
He'd drifted in and out, dreaming disturbing images of memories from his past while unconscious, enduring the unfamiliar dinginess of the world around him while awake.
Just when he'd thought he would die at last, an angel had walked by and he'd reached out, defeated, to beg her to take him with her to heaven, or at least walk with him part of the way to hell.
The angel must have taken pity on him. She'd brought him to a place of clean, white odors and dry warmth—it might not be heaven, but it was a good substitute.
The last thing he remembered seemed more like hell.
No. The last thing he remembered was her, standing in the misty rain, saying, "I can't leave you, you hurt too much."
Or was there a newer memory? A memory of gentle hands brushing his cheek, loosening the buttons of his jeans, loosening the bonds of his conditioning. He remembered the delicious fullness in his loins, then the searing, nauseating agony in his thigh. He remembered stopping her, before she uncovered his shame.
Adrenalin shot through him again. That was it. The familiar sensation. Feelings. Nothing had ever felt as good as his angel's hands on him. Soothing hands, healing hands. Hands that comforted his fear and eased his pain. Hands that made him feel things a tank shouldn't feel.
Rider clenched his jaw, reminding himself of his mission. He needed to get out of here, wherever here was, and find his target. He pushed away the unfamiliar emotions before they triggered the nausea conditioned into him, and concentrated on what he knew.
The person he was looking for was a physician, so he needed to find the medical care facilities. That would be a good start.
He stirred, wincing against the pain, and prepared to push himself upright.
"Good morning," the angel said, cutting into his thoughts, her voice soothing and musical, with a teasing note in it. "Maybe you can talk to me now that you've had breakfast."
He squinted at her, frowning as she gestured toward a pole with a bag of liquid hanging from it.
Breakfast? He hadn't eaten, had he? He couldn’t remember the last time he'd eaten. His gaze followed the line of the tubing from the bag to his taped wrist. They were feeding him through his veins, like they'd done in the TAINCC.
Disgust rippled through him. It was what he'd hated most about their damned conditioning—being invaded by the wires and tubes.
He took his gaze further, down to where a clean white sheet covered his lower body. A dreadful realization seeped into his hazy brain as he shifted his leg and felt the smooth fabric of the sheet against his bare skin. Naked. So now she knew.
He gritted his teeth against the burning sensation in his thigh as he glanced back at her face, steeling himself against the contempt reserved for the criminals and rejects from society who were conscripted by the government for the TAINCC. But she just watched him, a tiny smile on her lips.
It took a minute for his brain to adjust. He'd been conditioned but not really prepared. He was in the past, centuries before the TAINCC. No one here knew about tanks. Still, his face grow hot, embarrassed that she'd seen the mark, even if she didn't know what it meant. He snapped at her to cover his humiliation. "Where am I?"
His voice came out creaky, like one of the old wooden doors in—in what? He didn't know what he'd been thinking of, but the angel was speaking and he concentrated on her voice.
"You're at the Street Clinic. What happened to you?"
"Accident," he said automatically. He tried to sit up and realized that his middle was taped so tightly he could hardly move. "Clinic?"
She nodded.
Clinic. So that was why the tube was in his arm. His body tensed with apprehension. Maybe he could find out something about his target, or at least find out where the medical care facility was. "Can I leave now?"
"No." The angel's mouth widened in a larger smile, as if at a private joke.
Rider's eyes were drawn to her mouth. It was a nice mouth, with a vulnerable lower lip. An uncomfortable sensation tickled the back of his throat as an echo of emotions he wasn't supposed to have rippled through him and the burning in his thigh reminded him he couldn't afford to look at a woman in any way other than how she could help accomplish his mission.
"Mugged?" He was going to have to concentrate harder. His brain was still foggy and the words she used made no sense.
"Did someone attack you?"
"Some thing," he muttered, wincing as he remembered the brick wall rushing at him at light speed as he emerged from the long, dark tunnel of time. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then glanced at the angel. "When?" he asked.
"When what?" she asked, bending her head over his wrist where the IV needle was inserted, and touching the bandage with a tentative finger. Her touch sheared his breath. His gut tightened and the imprint they'd burned into his thigh sizzled. What the hell?
He searched his brain for an explanation. Hadn't the TAINCC conditioned all that out of him? The irony was he couldn't even tell if the feeling was desire or fear. Sometimes there wasn't much difference. "When can I leave?"
"Oh. As soon as you can stand up by yourself."
"I can do that right now, lady." Rider turned over on his side and prepared to push himself upright. When he stretched out his right arm he felt a ripping pain and the angel cried out sharply.
"Oh, no! Stop!"
She grabbed his wrist with quite a bit of strength, stealing his breath again. He couldn't remember anything that compared with the touch of her cool fingers on his skin. They were like a balm, soothing him, drawing out the pain.
Rider let her pull him back to lie on the table. As soon as he was flat again, the lights quit whirling quite so madly around his head. Maybe he would indulge her for a while, let her think he wasn't quite ready to get up. As the room quit spinning the rending pain in his wrist returned.
"Look what you've done. You've ripped your arm open. Now I've got to restart the IV in your other wrist." She glared at him, then turned back to the bloody wound, gently wiping gore away from the torn flesh. "If you try that again, I'll have you put back in restraints."
"Just who the hell are you, lady?" Rider growled through clenched teeth. One part of him wanted to jerk his arm away, to stop the treacherous feelings her touch evoked. But another part of him craved the comforting yet disturbing sensations.
"I'm the doctor, Mister!"
Rider closed his eyes. The Street Clinic. The doctor. A cold resignation warred with anticipation inside him. He remembered something else from the TAINCC. His target was a doctor, so he had to search the med care facilities, but he'd been warned about being examined.
"It could be dangerous," they'd told him. "If you're discovered you will be dissected like a lab rat."
What had they done to him that would tell a twentieth century physician he had come from the future? Incompetent bastards! He was at risk of being exposed because they couldn't get their damned machines calibrated enough to send him into the past without slamming him into a brick wall.
"It might be a little rough. You might be a little shaken up. Nothing to worry about, though, you'll be fine."
Fine, hell! For all he knew, he was supposed to be dead now. After all, there was no communication after transfer. He'd signed on for the ultimate one-way trip, five hundred years into the past. A bitter amusement curled his lip. Well, maybe one of the two ultimates—if you counted death.
They'd explained it all to him. Once he was back here, he was on his own. There was no return. No second thoughts. The only way they could know if he had completed his mission into the past was if the future changed. And he was only the third tank ever sent back successfully, and the only volunteer. They'd blown up several poor bastards before they'd given up on sending metal back.
The first two must have failed though, because the Deviants hadn't disappeared. So they'd sent him.
He laughed, then gasped as his messed up ribs ground against each other. He was probably the first one who'd made it alive.
Damn big responsibility, Rider old man. A frisson of fear rippled up his spine. He was stranded in this godforsaken time.
He needed to get out of here. He needed to figure out what to do, but right now, he couldn't even sit up. He felt like he'd been drugged, and he was damned tired. Too tired to run. Too tired to care.
But not too tired to be affected by the emotions the do-good doctor's touch was eliciting from him. He searched inside himself for the cold hatred that was supposed to sustain him.
"You want to tell me your name now, Mister?"
Rider squinted one eye and took a long, slow breath full of the strange spicy scent and enticing aura of femaleness that wafted from her like perfume and played hell with his conditioning. "No."
"Are you going to start that crap again?"
"Crap?"
"That 'no' crap! I'm tired of your monosyllabic answers. I practically saved your life. I, at least, ought to rate more than 'no'."
"No, ma'am."
Her eyes flashed with golden fire and her lips twitched. Something tickled the edge of Rider's brain like a memory, a very important memory, but it flitted away as fast as a dream upon waking.
"How about this one, then," she continued, "and I dare you to answer no to it. Would you like something to eat so I don't have to restart that IV?" She crossed her arms and stared triumphantly at him.
He still thought she looked like an angel, although he'd never heard of an angel with black curly hair and eyes like a cat. Still, even if he was in heaven, his stomach rumbled just like it always did when he forgot to eat.
He glanced down at his bandaged wrist and up at the IV bag. "Yes." Anything to get rid of the tubes.
"Hallelujah! We have a 'yes!' I'll be right back."
Rider watched her leave. She took the spicy scent and the disturbing sensations with her. Good, because when her big bright eyes were on him, he had trouble remembering why he was here.
What was it about her eyes anyway? A twinge of nausea reminded him that he didn't have the luxury of thinking of people in any terms but that of hisassigned mission. For tanks, there were only two types of people—targets and everyone else.
His target. He had to get out of here. Once these people started asking questions, running tests, they'd realize he wasn't one of them. They'd find out he'd been dosed with steroid-enhanced vitamins and conditioned into single-minded resolve. Then, at best, he'd be executed. At worst, he'd be caged and studied like an animal.
Sadness and regret tried to worm their way into his consciousness—more of the feelings that should have been sucked out of him in the TAINCC. He tamped them down with the cold hatred, and took his first good look at his surroundings.
Things actually weren't much different here than in his time. He was lying on a table covered with a sheet. A real wood desk and chair were the only other furnishings. There were two wooden doors, one through which the angel doctor had disappeared. The other was open and led into a bathroom.
So much wood. That was different. He wondered if the doors creaked like the door to his office in the History Building. His office. He tried to concentrate on that thought, but it evaded him.
As his angel came back in with a big glass of yellow liquid and some fragrant pie-like things on a plate, he decided as soon as he ate, he'd escape. After all, he couldn't locate his target if he was locked away like a barking mongrel. He sipped tentatively at the liquid. Orange. The taste evoked a haunting image of bright sunlight, bright hair.
Distracted by his odd thoughts, he drank the juice down in a few huge gulps. "What's that?" he said, nodding toward the plate.
The angel looked at him as if he'd lost his mind. "Pizza," she said carefully.
"Oh." Pete-sah? What in the hell was pete-sah? He tried to appear casual and uninterested as he studied the plate. He'd been briefed on preferred eating habits and local favorites, but he couldn't remember a damn thing right now. His brain was fuzzy, his ribs hurt and she had brought her woman's fragrance and soothing presence back into the room with her.
He lifted a piece of the 'pete-sah" to his mouth, but the pleasant fragr
ance turned nauseating and he dropped it back onto the plate, shuddering.
"What?" Angel-doctor looked puzzled. "Is it bad?" She sniffed. "It's just left over from lunch."
He stared at the triangle. "Flesh —" he whispered, gagging on the word.
"Flesh? You mean meat?"
"Meat?"
"Yes, meat. Pepperoni, sausage, ham—meat!" Her multi-colored eyes assessed him with all the analytical coolness of the researchers who handled the TAINCC. "I think maybe I'd better see about getting you to the hospital. You need a CT scan, or an MRI. You may have some internal swelling in your brain."
"No!" He shouted, close to panic. He couldn't let them examine him. He had to stop making mistakes. The bastards had told him he was totally prepared. Had they forgotten to mention these people ate meat? Or had he forgotten? "Look, ange—doctor, its okay. I'm fine. I just don't —"
She observed him as if he were a specimen under a microscope. "Oh," she said slowly. "You're a vegetarian."
"Vege—right." So, at least everybody didn't eat flesh. Maybe he wouldn't starve.
"I'll order you a veggie pizza. Meantime you need to sleep."
"Look, I —" Rider gestured vaguely toward his legs. "I don't seem to have any clothes on. What if I need to —?"
Angel-doctor chuckled. "Don't worry. You're catheterized," she tossed back over her shoulder as she left.
Rider lifted the sheet, knowing and dreading what he was going to see. Catheterized. Sure enough, another tube invaded him, this one so personal, so intimate—had she done it? His body tensed and the catheter jerked as a vivid image of her gentle hands on him flashed across his vision and a flutter of nausea made his mouth go dry. As soon as the vision rocked him, his damn thigh started burning like fire.
If the angel doctor had catheterized him, there was no doubt she had seen the imprint on his left thigh that bespoke his rank. But then, she had no idea what it meant to be a tank.
