Manipulator

by Thom Parsons

  Somebody had been in this memory before.

  It all made perfect sense to Owen. Somebody had tried to erase these specific parts of Marcus' memory before now. That made the circumstances on which Marcus was put into the hospital even more suspicious. There was something more going on here than met the eye.

  And Owen was caught right in the middle of it.

  “We’re only hearing Marcus,” Kate said with a slight hint of disappointment in her voice, yet solidifying the thought that was running through Owen’s head.

  “We’re only hearing his side of this conversation,” Owen clarified, speaking the words back to her slowly. “He’s here talking to others. I’m willing to bet that he’s talking to Alex Morgan as well as Ethan Darkes in this memory.”

  He left his conspiracy theories to one side whilst he and Kate sat and listened to the rest of Marcus’ audio based memory playing out around them.

  “… You can’t be serious!” his projecting voice continued, sounding out around them.

  “… You continued your research?”

  “… Amazing! Have you tested this as such yet?”

  “… Neither can I. This was always going to be the next logical step. Imagine the possibilities!”

  There was a break in the memory. Marcus, who had been sat back in his chair letting this play out now leaned forward, eyes open, with a concerned, frightened look on his face. “I can’t remember any of this conversation,” he said to both Owen and Kate, sounding utterly terrified, but his tone quickly changed as the anger began to seep in. “Somebody has been messing around in my head.”

  And there he had it. Owen had suspected it, but now he was damn sure. The anger in Marcus’ voice convinced him.

  “It could be that the car crash has damaged some of your brain’s memory centre?” Kate answered, trying to come to a logical conclusion, exploring other possibilities by talking out loud.

  “Maybe,” Owen replied. “Is that it? Is that the memory about Annie? It doesn’t seem like much,” he said, sounding massively disappointed.

  “Wait,” Marcus said urgently. His eyes were focused, the man was thinking hard. “My head is itching,” he said. “I think there’s more.”

  Again, he leaned back into his solo leather chair and closed his eyes.

  “We need to call the boss,” his audio alter-ego said out loud into thin air. It was more of a concerned tone now compared to how he had been talking earlier. There was a short lull in the audio playing out around them after he spoke. Owen assumed that somebody else in the memory was on a phone call to some sort of boss.

  The boss? Of course they have a boss. Marcus, and presumably Alex and Ethan must have been working for someone.

  But who?

  Marcus must have been sitting and waiting to hear the results of the phone call in this audio memory. Less than a minute later, his voice chipped back in, giving Owen more fragments of a conversation.

  “… Are we to implement phase two?”

  “… You heard the boss.”

  And just like that, it was over. Silence filled the air around them. The conversation that they had come here for was over.

  “That’s it,” Marcus spoke quietly. “There’s nothing more.”

  “That doesn’t seem like much at all,” Kate said. “I’m sorry Owen.”

  Archer stood up, feeling a little fed up of sitting still in one place for too long. He rubbed the stubble under his chin as he spoke, knowing that he needed to clean himself up. “That’s because we’re not hearing the full conversation," he said to Kate. "We’re going to need the other pieces.”

  “So we need to find them? Alex and Ethan?” Kate asked from her seated position in the leather three-seater sofa. Her voice was half stating the truth, and half questioning herself at the same time.

  “Yes,” Owen said, nodding his head determinedly. “More urgently now than before. We need to find the two of them and find out what they were talking about here. Maybe then we can figure out what’s going on. Maybe then we can find out what really happened to Annie.”

  Owen stood still, deep in thought as Marcus eyed him up.

  “Who’s your boss, Marcus?” Kate asked, almost maliciously.

  “I don't remember,” Marcus replied quietly as he shook his head at her. He seemed genuinely sincere. The man sat before her was all out of answers.

  Kate nodded, already expecting the answer that she received. “What I don't understand so far,” she said. “Is what has all of this actually got to do with Annie Archer?”

  “It has everything to do with it,” Marcus replied, deeply calculating his words before he spoke them. It was as if he was trying to word it in the best possible way. He caught Owen's attention, who's eyes glared at the man, waiting to hear just what he had to say. “Owen,” Marcus started as he looked over at Owen. “I want to apologise, I need to clear my conscience. I never wanted any of th-”

  A gunshot rang out from behind them suddenly and unexpectedly. Owen and Kate both jumped out of shock as soon as the noise materialised.

  Owen moved quickly and instinctively ran over at Kate, diving at her and dragging her to the ground, worried that more shots were about to be fired. But the second that they both hit the ground he knew that it was pointless. Only one shot had rang out, and that one bullet had hit its intended target. He looked up from the ground just in time to see Marcus fall to the floor lifelessly.

  Whoever fired that shot had done so with precision.

  Owen quickly jumped up to his feet, his head snapping around trying to see where the gunshot had come from. Out in the corridor from which they had entered this common room, Owen spotted a dark figure running away, trying to escape after they had completed what they had come here to do.

  Owen boiled up into a fit of anger, pulled out his gun, and ran full pelt after the figure dressed all in black. He needed to get to whoever it was before they could leave PRoGRaM. The dark figure in front of him had just taken his only valid lead in finding out what had happened to Annie, and Owen sure as hell wasn’t going to let them get away.

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  Date: December 9th 2035

  Location: PRoGRaM

  Whatever the hell is going on, it’s clear that whoever the fuck this is has no interest in me or Kate. Owen caught himself thinking as he ran at top speed, bursting out of the door of the common room. Ahead of him, a fair way down the corridor and dressed completely in black was the man that had shot Marcus. Wearing a black hoodie that covered the back of his head, Owen saw no immediate features that told him who this person was.

  He ran as fast as he possibly could down the corridor after the dark figure. The man turned a corner and Archer lost line of sight, but the figure was seemingly making a move back towards the huge entrance hall where Owen and his team had recently entered this place. Has he been following us the entire time?

  Owen had left Kate behind without second thought, but only because she would have slowed him down. She'll be safer back in the room anyway. This is something I need to do.

  Running around a corner, Owen caught line of sight once again with the dark figure ahead of him. The hooded man ran fast, occasionally glancing over his shoulder every so often to see how far behind him his pursuer was. Owen couldn’t see the man’s face. All that lay under his hood was a black balaclava. The dark figure was clearly trying to make sure that he was untraceable. But that won’t matter if I catch him.

  As Owen gave chase, he ran out into the grand entrance hall where he had entered this PRoGRaM Headquarters, and saw something new and incredible that he had never seen inside PRoGRaM before. What could only be described as a portal opened itself up on the wall in the main entrance hall.

  The portal was circular, hanging just to the right of the huge double doored main entrance. It was huge, big enough to easily fit a man through. The edges of the portal seemed to be swirling around clockwise in a blur of all colours imaginable, a rainbow surrounding the passage into what looked li
ke another dimension. And the dark figure was running right towards it.

  What struck Owen the most was the feeling of the wind blowing through his hair as he entered the huge entrance hall. It was seemingly coming from whichever part of the world that the portal led to. Looking closely at it as he ran forwards, Owen could see that it was some form of instantaneous transporter to another point in this PRoGRaM world. At this very moment, he could see blue skies and rooftops through the portal on the wall, and could feel the light breeze that was seeping through it and into the entrance hall.

  Oh my God... Owen thought as he continued to run after the dark figure who was heading straight towards the portal. Whoever I’m up against here has some tricks the likes of which me or Nick have never even dreamed of. Between the two of them, they had never even conceived the idea of creating a portal system before. An instantaneous way to move between points in the world. They had always considered The White Room as their portal system. But this incredible display in front of Owen was a whole new level of transportation.

  He ran harder, desperate to catch up to the man in front of him, and desperate to get the answers he was looking for. If I lose this lead now, maybe I’ll never find out what happened to Annie. I won’t let that happen.

  The dark figure of a man that he was chasing got close enough to the wall where the portal was situated and he jumped through, curling his body up in mid-air so not to catch himself on the edges of the portal. Owen continued to run, gun in hand, edging closer and closer to the portal with every step. As he made it halfway across the grand hall, Owen saw just why his target had curled himself up in the air.

  The portal was slowly closing, shrinking down into its centre point.

  The wall which it occupied was gradually blurring back to its original design before the portal had been opened, being replaced once again by plain brick and stone, but this only made Owen run harder and faster. A determined look covered his face as he told himself that he would not lose this lead.

  With every step he took closer to the portal, Owen saw more of the bright rooftop cityscape that awaited him on the other side. It was a stark contrast to the old 17th century mansion that he had spent the last thirty seconds running through. But more importantly, Owen saw that the dark figure was there on the other side, no longer running away. Instead, he was stood attempting to catch his breath, and that gave Owen just what he needed.

  Time to catch up.

  The man looked over his shoulder, back through the closing portal to see Owen running straight for him. With the determination clear in Archer's face, the figure caught their breath quickly and then carried on running, continuing their escape across the city rooftops, somehow knowing that Owen wouldn’t give up.

  With every step that Archer took, the portal edged closer and closer to sealing up at its centre. Only a few metres stood between him and the wall, and the portal was almost closed, potentially cutting off his only chance to find out what was going on with Annie. So instinctively, Owen did the only thing that he could think of to get through.

  He dived headfirst through the portal.

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Date: December 15th 2035 (Present Day)

  Location: Unknown

  “This guy that I was chasing,” Owen began. “He was a true manipulator. He made me look like an amateur.”

  “That's a strong choice of words," Victoria noted.

  “I’m not afraid to admit it. The coding on these portals was complete genius. They were an absolute work of art.”

  “These portals…” Victoria said, talking slowly, taking notes as she spoke. “The one your assassin escaped through. How do they work?”

  Owen repositioned himself once again in his chair and thought about how to explain it. “The portal system is essentially the ability to manipulate into existence a wormhole between any two points in the PRoGRaM world. It put Nick’s White Room to shame. These portals… They could instantaneously move you from point to point inside PRoGRaM.”

  “I see,” Victoria replied, picking up Owen’s file and flicking through some of the pages in front of her, seemingly looking for one thing in particular. “Going off this talk of portals, I can actually now make sense of some of these case notes about you,” she said, finding the page in the file that she was looking for and studying it.

  “Now I understand what this here means,” she continued as she slightly shook the bit of paper that she held. “About how you managed to adapt this portal system to your own benefit later on with the prison-“

  “That’s getting ahead of things again,” Owen cut in.

  “You’re right,” Victoria conceded with a slow nod. “So, getting back to the assassination of Marcus. It seems coincidental that you managed to follow this… ‘dark figure’ through the first portal,” she said sceptically. “Have you considered the possibility that maybe he wanted you to follow him?”

  “No,” Owen fired back at her. “The speed at which a portal closes is tied to the distance between the two ends of the portal. The longer the distance between these two points, the longer that the portal will take to close down. That’s why I managed to follow him back through the first portal into central New York.” Owens tone changed. Suddenly, he began to sound disappointed.

  “And that’s why I couldn’t follow him through the second portal,” he said quietly, feeling slightly ashamed. “That’s why, in the end, I lost him.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Date: December 9th 2035

  Location: PRoGRaM

  Owen hit the ground hard.

  His attempt to get himself through the portal had meant diving headfirst through the ever-closing gap in front of him, forcing him to hit the ground face down on the other side. Owen hurt all over as he belly-flopped the floor, knocking the wind out of him and the gun out of his hand, if only for a second. He quickly and instinctively checked the lower half of his body, hugely concerned that he may have lost a part of himself to the portal during the dive.

  Satisfied that his whole body was still intact, and that no parts of his legs had been left back at the PRoGRaM Headquarters, he immediately got up onto his feet as fast as he could, grabbing his gun up off the ground next to him. Directly in his line of sight, Owen spotted the dark figure that had assassinated Marcus, running away at some serious speed across the rooftops that they were now on.

  Owen took pursuit. There was no way that he was about to let his only lead in this case get away from him.

  Taking in his surroundings as he ran, Owen noticed that he was once again back in New York City. He looked around, attempting to pinpoint his exact location, but he was too busy focusing on running at full speed across some adjoining rooftops after the man that had shot Marcus. Owen watched ahead as the dark figure took a running jump, suddenly disappearing from his vision.

  It only made Owen run faster.

  Seconds later, Owen reached the gap where only moments before, his assassin had vanished. Stretching out before Owen was a one story drop down to the rooftop below him. Without breaking his stride, Owen jumped.

  For a few seconds, he floated gracefully through the air before hitting the floor of the opposing rooftop, forcing himself into a roll to take the brunt of the impact. As he completed his roll and got some serious momentum going, Owen suddenly froze up with the sight that lay before him. He rooted his feet to the ground and skidded himself to a halt with the gravel of the rooftop.

  The dark figure was mere metres ahead of him, standing still, pointing his gun directly at Owen. He saw the hopelessness of the situation immediately, and instinctively brought his arms up to cover his body and face, knowing full well that it wasn’t going to do much to stop a bullet. But he just couldn’t fight that instinct.

  Owen flinched and braced himself for the end. The assassin standing before him emptied the entire clip of his weapon. Owen's eardrums rang out as the sound of gunfire pierced them. Yet, after the gunfire had ended, Owen was amazed to find that he hadn’t been hit
by a single round from the assassins weapon.

  But that was never his plan, was it? Owen realised. Those gunshots had distracted Owen for just long enough to let the assassin get away. Owen lowered his arms quickly and looked around, trying to get a lead on which way his target had escaped to. The figure was running fast across the current rooftop, a good distance ahead of Owen now, heading straight towards a wooden door at the end of it, presumably leading down into the building below.

  Owen picked up the pace and gave chase as the assassin ran, edging ever closer to the door in front of him.

  But then, without warning, a portal opened up right in front of the dark figure against the wall and door, easily allowing the man to escape his situation. The dark figure jumped through the portal with ease, never even looking back. Owen ran hard, desperate to catch the figure before the portal closed up. He was only metres away now, he could almost touch it…

  But as suddenly as the portal had appeared, it disappeared.

  Running as fast as he could just wasn’t enough as the portal closed up just before Owen reached it. He watched in shock as the dark figure he was chasing disappeared from his line of sight. What was more worrying was the fact that he was running so fast the he was never going to stop himself before hitting the wooden door in front of him.

  Owen angled his body sideways and used his forward momentum to shoulder barge straight through the wooden door that lay in his path, completely unprepared for what lay on the other side. The door smashed into hundreds of pieces as Owen fired himself through it and fell roughly down a long flight of stairs on the other side.

  Dazed and shocked, yet confident that no permanent physical damage was done, Owen lay still, surrounded by pieces of the wooden door that he had smashed, scattered all around him. He picked himself up haphazardly in a fit of anger and kicked out at some of the splintered pieces of the door.