Absolute Unit

by Nick Kolakowski

  “I thought I was having a stroke or something.”

  “Far from it. We have figured out how to interface with the human nervous system, but it is an imperfect joining at moments.” We draw a crude figure of a human being in the sand, with small lines radiating down the spine and limbs, simulating our takeover. “With every new human, the responses to stimulus are different, sometimes frighteningly so.”

  “New human? You’ve had other hosts?”

  “Yes. Your uncle, for instance. Which is how we found our way to you. When he blocked Frank’s bullet? That was us, literally pulling his leg.” We draw a line through our figure’s ankle.

  “Why would you choose Bill? I mean, I love him, but he’s not exactly the healthiest guy if you’re looking for a host.”

  “Pure circumstance. He swallowed us in a glass of water.”

  “So, when you said you had ‘skills,’ you mean you can control people? Make them fight or dodge or whatever?”

  Over the dull rumble of surf, we hear that machine sound again, louder now, shaking the sand around us. Trent doesn’t seem to notice. “Yes,” we tell him, suddenly anxious. We might be running out of time.

  “What made you so good at fighting?” Trent asks.

  We wrap a long tendril around his wrist. Much to his credit, he doesn’t flinch. We feel the buzz of Trent’s thoughts. “Can you sense us?”

  “Yes. It’s like . . . a tingle?”

  We try sending Trent an image: Bill plopped in his plump living-room chair, before the bright altar of the jumbo television, watching hour after hour of action movies. Bruce Lee snapping ribs, Arnold Schwarzenegger gunning down legions of knuckleheads, Chow Yun-Fat charging through a crossfire hurricane with a pistol in each hand: our cinematic holy trinity. You could say we became a connoisseur of the genre, memorizing the best neck-cracks and grunting takedowns.

  “Do you see?” we ask.

  “Yes. But I’ve watched a lot of action movies, too. That doesn’t make me a ninja.”

  “Because you are frightened. We are not. We can analyze faster than you, react faster than you. Alone, we don’t have any chance. Together, we have a small one.”

  “So what do you need?”

  “Full control.”

  The humming is louder now, more of a rumble, which Trent finally notices, glancing up and down the beach before asking, “What the hell does that mean?”

  “We need access to your cortex.”

  A larger wave crashes around us, and Trent plants his feet more firmly against the boiling surf. “But even if I wanted to give that to you, how would I do it?”

  We hate to admit that we have no idea. The gray fortress of Trent’s skull is a formidable barrier. Maybe full control isn’t possible. “We don’t know.”

  “In that case,” Trent says, “you’re going to have to make do. You got my right arm. What else?”

  “Your legs, with varying degrees of success. Your left arm, too, if we can maintain our grip on a certain nerve.”

  “Then fight with that. Now that I’m aware of you, I won’t stop you.”

  The machine noise keeps rising. Another big wave hits us, almost knocking Trent over as we plant our tendrils deep in the sand to stay upright. The sky trembles and spreads apart like grease on a hot skillet, Big Jim’s voice booming Almighty loud: “Get him the hell downstairs.”

  14.

  Trent opens his eyes.

  He’s in a windowless storage room, its sides lined with shelves loaded with canned goods, bags of flour, boxes of dried meats. Through the thick steel door comes the roar and clang of a kitchen in mid-shift, chefs yelling in Spanish as they wrestle with a tide of orders.

  Trent winces at a line of pain around his wrist. He’s handcuffed to a floor-to-ceiling pipe, the cuff tightened until it threatens to break the skin. He tries to stand and the cuff smacks against a flange, stopping him in a crouch. He plops back onto cold concrete, tears brimming in the corners of his eyes.

  Stop it, we tell him, hoping he’ll somehow hear—and wonder of wonders, he does.

  I can’t, he thinks at us. Then: Wait, you weren’t a dream?

  No.

  “God,” Trent says, scratching at his neck and arms with his free hand. “Am I fucking losing it?”

  Calm down. If you don’t, we’re not getting out of here.

  Despite our request, Trent’s heart speeds, his forehead beading with sweat despite the coolness of the room. We squeeze out dopamine until he relaxes.

  What did you just do to me?

  We can control your hormones, other chemicals. We offer another burst of happy juice, just to prove our point. Notice how quickly you’ve calmed down today?

  Dude, that’s awesome. Give me more!

  No. Too much, and you’ll burn out. So, we have direct communication with the host. While it’s not exactly full control, Trent seems amenable to our presence.

  Trent plops on the floor as we perform another quick damage assessment. Parts of our core are singed, and we may no longer control Trent’s left leg, but otherwise we seem more intact than we have any right to expect. Lactic acid drenches Trent’s muscles around our tendrils, harsh as cold coffee. What did they hit us with upstairs?

  “Oh man,” Trent says. “My jacket’s gone. I loved that thing.”

  We have bigger problems, we tell him. Hear those footsteps outside?

  The door crashes open, revealing the Mountain. In his left hand, he holds the largest taser we’ve ever seen. Well, that explains how he put us under. A couple thousand volts to the back of the neck will make anyone feel a bit poorly.

  The Mountain steps into the room, followed by Big Jim with his cigar tucked into the corner of his mouth. The stogie looks half-smoked, which, if it’s the same one he lit upstairs, means twenty minutes or so have passed since the Mountain fried our circuits.

  “Carrie,” Trent says.

  Big Jim shrugs. “She’s fine. Which is to say, she’ll get over it. She really cares for you, but she’s young.”

  “I want to see her.”

  “Sure, yeah. But first, I want to talk a bit about our mutual friend Frank and your uncle Bill.” Retrieving a stepstool from between two shelves, plunking it on the tile near Trent (but just beyond the reach of Trent’s kicks), Big Jim takes a seat before continuing: “I think you’re lying to me.” He blows smoke in Trent’s face. “In fact, I know you are. Our friends with the police, they tell me you were present when Frank got splattered.”

  Trent coughs and waves the noxious smoke away. “I didn’t see anything.”

  Big Jim leans closer, smoke boiling from his mouth like a dragon readying to flambé a troop of knights. “Explain. And tell the truth. If I don’t believe you, then believe me when I say I’ll use your skull for a bong.”

  “It was all happening in another car. The one Bill and your guy were in. I just saw some movement, like, maybe a fight? And then Frank went flying out the car?”

  “Not sure I’m getting full compliance here,” Big Jim tells the Mountain.

  The Mountain grunts and flicks a switch on the taser, which spits blue electricity.

  “See that?” Big Jim grins. “Vernon, he loves that taser. And trust me, you should love it, too, because Vernon has . . . other proclivities. He’s going to zap you now, and you might think a little bit of electricity to your cranium is the worst, but trust me, if I let Vernon give you a backdoor pounding? Well, you won’t be a happy camper.”

  The Mountain thunders across the room, tossing the sparking taser from hand to hand. We sense an opportunity here, if he comes a little closer, but we’re thwarted when he stops behind Big Jim’s stool.

  “My uncle, Bill? He told me that he and Frank had some sort of arrangement.” Trent swallows. “Didn’t say what that arrangement was, okay? Just that there was money involved.”

  “He mention anything about Frank’s mother?”

  Trent’s grimaces. “Huh?”

  Big Jim snarls: “Frank’s mother, big la
dy, curses like a sailor. Did. He. Mention. Her?”

  “No?”

  “Look.” Big Jim rubs his face and sighs. “You might think I’m a bad guy, a big scary drug dealer, but I’m just trying to make my way in the world like anyone else. I own this restaurant, which I’d dearly like to see succeed on its own merits. I even have a charity I run.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. It’s called Lucky Lumber. We give good, hard wood to anyone who needs it.” Big Jim struggles not to laugh. “Only in ten-inch lengths, though.”

  “Oh.” Trent frowns. “That’s not very funny.”

  “You’re not in a position to make comments on my humor. Vern?”

  The Mountain stomps forward, the taser looming large in our vision.

  I have an idea, we shout up Trent’s brainstem, and follow that up with a sequence of little images, a short movie that shows how we just might escape this storage room alive. Trent grunts agreement, shifting his legs beneath him—a movement that makes the Mountain pause, unsure if the kid wants to try something aggressive and stupid.

  “My uncle did tell me one thing,” Trent says. “A package that belonged to Frank?”

  Big Jim’s face flickers. “What about the package?”

  “It’s at his house,” Trent says. “In the safe in his bedroom.”

  “That safe have a code?”

  “Yeah.” Trent smirks. “You let me out of here, and I’ll call and give it to you. Whatever you were into with my uncle or Frank or whoever, I don’t give a crap. I know if I try to trick you, you’ll find me later, so I have no reason to lie.”

  Good kid: he followed our script, while adding some effective improvisation. That last line about trickery was pure genius.

  Big Jim peers into the cigar smoke swirling around his head as if it will show him the future. “I have a better idea. How about we drive over to your uncle’s place, you open the safe, and then we let you go? It’d be too bad if we let you leave here, and then you got hit by a bus or something before you made that call.”

  We anticipated he would say this. Not the best scenario, but it buys us time. Anything is better than expiring in a storage room next to the canned tomato sauce. “Fine,” Trent says. “I’ll take you.”

  The Mountain slips the taser into a pocket and, bending over, uncuffs Trent from the pipe. For a magical moment, as his fragrant crotch orbits a little too near toTrent’s head, we consider driving Trent’s right fist into those oversized family jewels, followed by a leg-sweep. Chances of success: fifty percent, maybe. Knocking out the Mountain would still leave Big Jim, who, if he’s like the stereotypical gangsters in movies, hides a pistol or knife somewhere inside that beautiful suit. Without the element of surprise, he’ll kill or maul us.

  The Mountain pulls Trent to his feet with the greatest of ease and shoves him across the room. They exit to the kitchen, where the chefs working the line take particular care not to look in our direction. How many doomed people have they seen leave that room?

  In the parking lot, a worker in gray coveralls hoses down the mini-cars, the water running in a soapy river to the gutter. Carrie leans against her vehicle, an unlit cigarette in her mouth. She’s pale, her gaze locked on an oily puddle near her feet. However Big Jim described her “promotion,” it obviously failed to excite her. She looks up as Trent comes through the door, and it’s like the sun breaking through the clouds: the blood rushes back into her cheeks, the edges of her lips tugging into a smile.

  Then she sees the Mountain and Big Jim emerging behind Trent, and the smile fades. Slipping the cigarette back into her jeans, she runs her hands through her hair and stiffens her spine.

  “I thought you’d be gone by now,” Big Jim tells her.

  “Just having a smoke.” Carrie shrugs. “Nicotine keeps me awake.”

  “I don’t pay you to smoke.” Big Jim tosses his own cigar into the hose runoff, which carries it hissing toward the gutter and the sea. “I pay you to get your tasks done.”

  Carrie turns to Trent, and her voice wavers: “Are you okay?”

  The Mountain grips a handful of Trent’s shirt, just beneath the collar, and tugs him to a halt. The Mountain’s other hand extends so Trent can see the monster taser in his peripheral vision. “I am very okay,” Trent says, trembling slightly. “I am so okay, you wouldn’t believe it. Never better.”

  “Your boy is taking us on a very special errand,” Big Jim says, placing a hard hand on Trent’s shoulder. “But don’t worry, we’ll be back in an hour or so.”

  Carrie opens her mouth to say something else when rubber screeches in the alley, followed by the roar of a powerful engine. A black van barrels through the entrance to the parking lot, fishtailing to a stop fifteen feet away. The angle of the sun makes it impossible to see through the dusty windshield. The side doors bang open, revealing our friends Pink Bunny and Angry Fox.

  They’re holding machine guns.

  But at least they have pants on.

  15.

  At the sight of trouble, the worker in coveralls drops his hose and runs for the kitchen door. Angry Fox socks his rifle to his shoulder, aiming at that fleeing head, but Pink Bunny shoves the barrel aside with an oversized paw.

  Pink Bunny says something muffled by plastic and fake fur. Angry Fox shouts back, louder but equally unintelligible, before ripping the barrel from his friend’s grip. The worker disappears into the building, the door slamming behind him. The forgotten hose rolls across the concrete, spurting water.

  “The hell is this?” Big Jim asks, more amused than angry.

  Trent and Carrie, of course, know exactly what this is. All these furries had to do was look up the pizza restaurant’s address. The weapons suggest they’re not here to order an extra-large Gut Bomb and a side order of garlic knots.

  No fool, Carrie ducks behind her car. Trent stands frozen between Big Jim and the Mountain. Angry Fox strides forward, raising the rifle again, yelling muffled gibberish.

  “I can’t hear you,” Big Jim says, smiling. “You better take off that ridiculous head.”

  Big Jim’s calm seems natural, given his profession. Who knows what kind of freak she greets on a daily basis? He steps to one side, his hands near his waist, creating some space between him and Trent and the Mountain.

  Get ready to duck, we tell Trent.

  Calm me down! Right now!

  Wimp, we joke, but squeeze dopamine into his blood until his cells sing as pure and golden as a thousand angels on the head of a pin. He could dance a tango right here, if only the Mountain released his grip on the back of his shirt.

  Thank you, Trent thinks. Now, how do we survive?

  Before we can answer, Pink Bunny plods toward us, struggling to keep his rifle leveled with one hand as he roots through his hip pouch with the other. Small bottles of lube, something pink and rubbery and floppy as a deep-sea creature, and a green banana hit the wet concrete in his wake. As he approaches Trent, he finally pulls out a pair of handcuffs lined with white fur.

  Angry Fox murmurs something.

  “What was that?” Big Jim asks, cupping a hand behind his ear.

  “BOY PUTS ON THE CUFFS,” Angry Fox yells through the thick layers of cotton and polyurethane.

  “Looks like you got a date, Trent,” Big Jim says.

  Pink Bunny tosses the handcuffs to Trent, who catches them, before turning to Carrie crouched beside the mini-car’s front wheel. Gripping his rifle two-handed now, Pink Bunny screeches: “BOY CUFFS HIMSELF TO GIRL.”

  “So kinky.” Big Jim’s hands skim his jacket. “Then what?”

  “BOY AND GIRL COME WITH US,” Angry Fox jabs his weapon in Trent’s direction.

  Trent pops the cuffs open, running his fingers along the fur. The material probably reminds him of his dearly departed jacket. We hope he’s thinking something comforting like that, because if he freaks out, either the severely irate Fox or the panicky Bunny will give him a hot-lead facelift.

  Don’t put those on, we tell him. Let
this play out.

  But . . . but . . . they might shoot!

  So much for not panicking. Not yet, they won’t. Tilt your head down a bit, please?

  Trent obeys without asking questions, and we study the pavement through his eyes. His positioning is just fine, provided a number of events happen in the proper order. And there’s nothing ‘proper’ about a brewing gunfight between furries and drug dealers. We’ll have to trust fate, and fate has allowed us to survive this long, right? Right?

  Tell Big Jim why they want you, we order.

  “When we were delivering pizza, we saw these people having sex,” Trent says. “In those costumes. And one of them, he was dying or something. Older guy, he looked important . . . ”

  It was the mayor. Don’t you read the news?

  “It—it was the mayor,” Trent stammers. “That’s what the little voice in my head tells me.”

  Our costumed friends freeze, their rifle-barrels wavering. Every sound seems too loud, too present: the water rushing into the gutter, the Mountain’s guttural breathing, the low hum of traffic on a distant street, even the rustle of Big Jim’s fingertips against the fabric of his suit.

  And then Big Jim starts laughing.

  “Gotta be fuckin’ kidding me,” he says, once he pauses to take a breath. “That law-and-order dipshit of a mayor is a furry freak? Well, color me shocked.”

  Angry Fox points his rifle at Big Jim. “STOP IT. THE MAYOR IS A GREAT MAN.”

  We sense this is the moment. Neither rifle is pointing at Trent or Carrie. The Mountain is distracted. We’re taking control, we tell Trent.

  Okay. He takes a deep breath, holds it. Make it so.

  But before we can move Trent’s arm, Big Jim does what we expected all along—his hand darts beneath his jacket, reappearing with a small automatic plated in gold. He levels the pistol at Pink Bunny and pulls the trigger twice.

  One round sparks off Pink Bunny’s rifle, while another plows through his helmet with a loud thump that sounds like a baseball bat smacking a mattress. Tufts of pink fur and white stuffing shoot from the exit hole, and Pink Bunny drops the rifle, fluffy hands rising for the sky.