Chapter #65The New "Newgordon" by: Seuzz   "Sure, Kim sounds like a good idea," you mumble.
Will Prescott claps you on the back. "Good call. I thought you'd go for it, which is why I suggested it." He grins, but there's no meanness in it. "Well, I gotta go," he says as he stands up. "Dad's waiting for me. He's probably all kinds of pissed off too. Almost nothing changes." He makes a face. "I'll, uh, shoot out an email to the guys when I get back home. You just hang loose."
He gives you that stupid little two-fingered salute you sometimes use when you're feeling large and in charge, and saunters over to the door. "Yeah, can I go now?" he whines at the soldier who opens it. "My dad's waiting, and he's gonna kill me if he thinks I've been goofing off back here."
"What about that one?" The soldier nods at you.
"Fuck if I know. Keep him here until someone tells you what to do with him, right?" He disappears, and the door closes.
You put your head back on the table. Your brain is all a muddle. You try thinking things through, but you can't focus on anything except that in a little bit you are going to be leaving under a new face. And after that? Go with the flow, you guess.
Go with the flow ...
Your thoughts unwind into jumbled threads, and all the energy leaks out your joints. A great stillness settles over you.
You lay very still, under the impression that--
It's that throne again, what you felt at Blackwell's when the others made their escape. It's only the shadow of a reflection of you'd felt, but it feels like it's hovering over you, very near.
* * * * *
It must have been a dream, for you raise your head with a start, drool trailing out of the corner of your mouth. You blink hard. "Kim?" you say.
It's Kim Walsh. Small, pert, pale, freckled, button-cute-under-her-strawberry-blonde-bob Kim. She's in a lime-green blouse and jeans, and she's hugging herself. "Hi Will," she says. "I got an order to come out here and--" She shrugs awkwardly and waves a hand in front of her face.
You're hit by a pang of guilt. "I'm sorry, Kim."
"For what?"
"Well, for taking it from you."
"You're not taking anything from me," she says with a frown. "I'll still be here, it'll just be you running things on the inside."
You shake the mud from your brain. She's right, of course. "What about the, uh, the golem? You know, the one that's, uh--"
"Oh, they'll get it a new mask. Probably one of the soldiers here on base." She looks around. "You should probably get it over with. It's getting late, and dad wouldn't understand, since he's not, uh--"
Oh God, it's going to be like that again, huh? "Okay, come on then," you say as you stand up.
"Oh, one more thing. You're also supposed to take that with you--" She points to the sigil copy, still lying on the table where Colonel Lord had put it. "So you can start making copies."
"Sure." Your eyes water a little with embarrassment, now that it's come to the point. "Um, maybe we should get undressed first."
She shrugs, and showing very little self-consciousness she unbuttons her blouse and takes off her shoes and bra and jeans and panties. Since she's not being shy--and since you'll be wearing her body in a few minutes--you're not shy about watching her. She is extraordinarily pale underneath, the way a lot of redheads are, and her skin is almost blue under the harsh lights. But she's slim where it counts and padded where it counts, and she has a kind of coltish grace when she moves: adorably awkward, but with an underlying poise.
You also disrobe, and when all the clothes are off you lift the mask from the golem. A stone-like Kim Walsh appears beneath.
It's rather a horrible moment for you. You've always liked Kim, because she's a nice girl, and you're moved by sudden pity and sadness for her state. You really wish you knew that you were doing the right thing by cooperating with the golems.
You are cooperating with them, aren't you? It sure seems that way. You don't know which would be worse: That you're actually cooperating with them, or that you're too much of a coward to have gone through with Frank's plan even after volunteering for it.
Maybe you could still find a way to act out the plan, or to act against the golems, even after muffing it so badly with the colonel? That fake you is being pretty friendly. He wouldn't let you touch his face. But if you got him alone, after switching out with someone big and strong, you could--
Oh, but there's what he said about putting it on. That wouldn't do any good.
Except you could pretend to be him, right, after getting rid of him? You and he look just alike. It could be like that story about the prince and the pauper. Except in this case, you're the prince who has to get back into the palace by pretending to be the pauper who has stolen the throne.
For a small eternity this seems like a doable plan. And then you remember that none of the golems knows that "Will Prescott" is really the boss. They only follow the orders from the email account, and you can't get access to it, not with it locked in that mask.
Dammit, they really have thought it through so neatly. They've been one step ahead of you and your friends all the way, from the moment you made that first, stupid golem.
But is it because they're so smart, or is it because Frank and them are so stupid? Spitefully, it occurs to you that you've been working with some real dumbasses. They were gambling you could infiltrate the golems from the inside, but they didn't tell you how to get in touch with them. And even if the plan had gone off, how would they have known where to find you?
How stupid do you have to be to miss the fact that if you put a spy inside an organization, you have to have some way of keeping contact with him?
Of course, you didn't see the problem either, but you weren't supposed to be the professional.
You're still holding Kim's mask and staring at the wall in a daze when you remember where you are and what you're supposed to be doing. You sway a little on your feet, and look down at the mask. Well, what's done is done. For the sake of her parents--as long as they are still real--you should play the part of their little girl. You lay on the table and put the mask to your face.
* * * * *
You're just slipping your bare feet into the canvas tennis shoes when the door opens. It's the soldier that Kim saw guarding the door when she came in. He's got a squashed up face, with a pug nose and thick lips, and since (despite yourself) you're rather enjoying Kim's tight body, you wonder if the golem resents having to be someone so ugly. "New orders for you just came through," the soldier says. He holds out a clip board.
You take the slip of paper with trembling fingers, for this runs counter to what your replacement--your boss--had earlier promised you. The orders are for "Kim Walsh" to report to a new address for "debriefing," and emphasizes that she is to bring "Will Prescott's clothes" and the "special paper for copying."
You nod, gather up the things, and the soldier escorts you out. It's nearly ten o'clock by your watch, and you wonder how you'll be able to explain to your parents why you're going to miss curfew.
But maybe that's the point. It was all a lie, and they're going to get rid of you.
But why not get rid of you here, on the base? It's been wheels within wheels for so long that you shouldn't even worry. But you can't help worrying.
You worry all the way along a line of corridors, all empty, and out a door. A company of soldiers is walking along, laughing, a few yards away. They're talking about a football game. It sounds so normal you're convinced they must be real people. And then they come closer, and swerve aside to crowd around you. "Is this him?" one of them asks.
"Yeah," your escort says.
"Interesting," another one says, and grabs you by the chin. "Cute, too."
You jerk your chin out of his hand. "Lay off," your escort says. "The brass thinks he's important. More important than your carcasses."
That's met by snorts, and they don't part to let you pass, and you have to squeeze between two of them. Your car--Kim's car--is parked a little ways away. You ignore a shout from one--"Don't be a stranger, now!"--as you get in.
Oh, it's horrible, utterly horrible. You have to get away. You can hide. Ditch Kim. She knows who all the golems are in Westside. You'll just get close to one of them and switch places. Someone with money. A guy. One of the teachers, maybe. And you'll take off and start a new life where they won't find you, at least for a good long time.
But if you run, they'll know you've betrayed them.
A new thought hits you as you drive out the gate. Maybe you should stick close to the fake you. Get someone in your family alone, switch places with one of them. You can do that: the Prescotts all answer to "newgordon." If you switch with one of them ... Maybe your duplicate will accidentally leave the email account open at some point. You've done that yourself, so maybe he will too. Just lay low, lay close, and snoop.
That seems like a good plan, but dangerous. You're supposed to report to that new address. Who knows if you'll be able to escape from it.   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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