TheCorporation

by Jesus Gonzalez

  Now she was actually crying. She actually seemed emotionally affected at the sight of him.

  “I didn’t mean to drive you away,” Susan said between sobs. “I just...wanted to get in a position with my career where I could be comfortable. You know...I wanted a stable position...one that...I could manage my time wisely and then...you know...” She wiped her eyes and looked at him. Alan was remembering the last five years of their relationship when she started to drift away emotionally, the time Corporate Financial started taking over. It was all coming back to him in quick images; the long nights alone in their townhouse, the weekends spent apart because she was always working, the vacations she started canceling because she had work to do, her inability to open up to him the way she used to when they’d first met. “I had to work like hell to make a reach for the brass ring because I knew that when I got it we could have a life together.” She looked at him, her blue eyes deep and penetrating. For the first time in years Alan thought he could see the woman he once knew before Susan was taken over by Corporate Financial. “Do you understand?”

  Alan wanted to understand. He was fighting to keep his emotions down. Seeing her like this—emotional, crying, having her be the way she was before she drifted away from him—was affecting him profoundly. “Yeah,” he said, swallowing his tears down. “I do. But Susan—”

  Susan stopped what he was going to say by pressing her index finger over his mouth. The feel of her skin on his lips sent a tingle of sensation down his spine and he felt his eyes pool with tears. “I know you understand,” she said. She drew closer to him and he could smell her perfume. Memories of their life together before she changed began to overwhelm him and he choked back a sob. “I know you remember the way things were before I put things on hold so I could work on my career. I thought you would understand. I know that you were working hard too and that—”

  “I didn’t abandon you though!” Alan cried out, and now he couldn’t help it. He started crying. “I was always there for you! Always! I never put my job over our relationship!”

  “I know,” Susan said, breaking down again. “And I’m so sorry. I really am, Alan. I never wanted this to happen.” She tried to embrace him but Alan pulled away. “Please Alan!” She pleaded. “Don’t pull away from me now!”

  “Oh, so now you want me back!” Alan cried. Susan’s form was blurry through his tears. He wiped them away with his fingers. “Now that your career is at the place you want it, you think you can just come back to me and we can pick up where we left off.”

  “I’d like to try,” Susan said. Alan couldn’t help but notice that she really had changed. She was no longer the unemotional corporate drone she’d turned into in the phase of their relationship. “I remember we talked about it before, when we first got together. How we wanted to get our careers started before we got settled into our relationship. Then we would get married...have a family. I...I know I was wrong to neglect you when I was working at getting to where I am now with my career, but...don’t I get another chance?”

  Alan felt a pang of guilt worm through him as he struggled to hold his emotions in. They had talked about this early on in their relationship, how they realized they would have to put in extra effort in their chosen career paths so they could get to a comfortable position to enable them to turn their attention to their relationship and starting a family. They were young when they first got together—just out of graduate school. They still had six years to go before each of them turned thirty and Alan remembered they’d talked about getting married when they turned twenty-six. Of course that never happened, their careers had been more demanding than either of them had expected, so they pushed it back another year, and then when they decided to get married at the age of twenty-eight it never happened because by then Susan was totally ensnared by Corporate Financial and had become a completely different person. She had changed so drastically in such a short time span that Alan felt like he didn’t even know her. She no longer had an interest in getting married, in having kids; she’d even lost interest in her hobbies. She’d never been around to talk about it because she was always working, and whenever he’d tried to bring the subject up she dismissed it.

  Or at least that’s how it seemed at the time. Seeing her here now, hearing what she was saying, was driving a spike of doubt into everything he had been led to believe in the past five years.

  “Alan...please!” Susan was crying; tears streamed down her cheeks. She grasped Alan’s upper arms and he instinctively reached out to her. “Please forgive me!”

  Alan couldn’t hold it in anymore. He was crying openly now. “Oh Susan!” he gasped, thinking, have I been suckered the whole time? Have I...have I lost my mind?

  “I’m in that place now, Alan,” Susan said. She melted against him and another piece of his armor slipped away at the feel of her body melding against his. “For the first time in my life I feel ready. I want you.” She looked up at him and there was no doubt in Alan’s mind now that he was looking at the woman—the real Susan Vickers—that he’d fallen in love with. “I want you and I want to live the rest of my life with you. I want to start over. I want to grow old with you, have your child—”

  Alan choked back a sob and held her, trying to stem the rising tide of emotions but unable to stop it. He just couldn’t believe this was happening. His Susan—his love—was back!

  And then he let the barriers down and the tears rolled more freely down his face and he cried, the long-buried emotions finally coming to the surface as he held her tightly, not wanting to let go of her ever again.

  “YOUR FATHER WANTS to see you,” Connie Dowling said, still struggling to break free of the tendrils that enveloped her body. “He’s...not far from here. When we...have these brief moments of...ourselves...you’re the first person we talk about.”

  Michelle’s vision was blurry from her tears as she fought to keep the intense emotions she was feeling down. Her throat hurt. Memories of her childhood were rushing past her, making the hurt even more raw and painful.

  “I know you remember,” Connie said. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Michelle watched and waited, wondering what to do. Connie seemed to be holding her breath. Her limbs trembled; a vein pulsed in her forehead. Michelle stifled back a cry. My God, what’s happening? Is she having a stroke? A heart attack?

  When Connie opened her eyes she released a long breath. Her eyes, empty and muddy-looking yesterday when she saw her, now had a vibrancy in them that Michelle had never seen before. Connie’s demeanor seemed to change, her face grimaced and then relaxed, as if some unseen force was doing battle within. Her eyes would go from cloudy and unemotional to being filled with stark fear and fiery passion. When she shook her head Michelle stepped back, nervous about what was happening.

  Finally the struggle stopped. Connie opened her eyes again and Michelle saw the urgency in them. “Run, Michelle! Get away from here now!”

  Michelle broke down, confused. “Mother, what’s happening to you?”

  Connie stifled back a sob of her own. “Michelle, I love you, please just listen to me and go!”

  “I have to get you out!” Michelle made an attempt to go back to where Connie was laying but stopped short of touching the tendrils attached to her mother’s skin.

  “No—” Connie Dowling shuddered, eyes locked open then suddenly closing again. When she opened them again she was panting. Her face was slick with moisture. She looked back at Michelle. “I know you...remember...when you were a child...and I’m sorry...please...trust those memories...” Her eyes closed and she went into those mini-convulsions again.

  Michelle backed into the corner near the door and sobbed.

  The episode lasted a long time—almost a minute. When it was over Connie Dowling lay prone on the cot. Michelle watched the slow rise and fall of her chest as she breathed, then her mother opened her eyes. “Michelle?”

  Michelle said nothing, too afraid to move.

  “Michelle?” Connie’s eyes travel
ed the room until they locked on her. They were the eyes of a warm, caring woman. “Michelle...listen to me.”

  “I’m so scared,” Michelle whimpered. All the memories and emotions that had come blasting through were now gone, leaving traces of themselves to linger in her mind.

  “Look at me,” Connie said quickly. “Listen to me. I’m...trapped, honey. I know that you know what’s going on, otherwise you wouldn’t be here. Your father and I...” Another small tremor passed through Connie and was gone quickly. “Your father...and I...were forced to watch you grow up as Corporate Financial took over us...our bodies...our minds...” She appeared to struggle again and her voice choked. “We always loved you. I know you didn’t know that then, that we didn’t tell you because...we couldn’t...Corporate Financial wouldn’t let us...but I’m telling you now...we always loved you.”

  Michelle stifled back another sob. Despite the fact that her mother’s voice sounded choked the emotion in it was genuine. This was her real mother speaking to her from somewhere deep inside the flesh and blood shell of her physical self, the part that had been taken over by Corporate Financial. Connie Dowling’s real self had emerged and was fighting for control. “Oh, mom!”

  Connie’s eyes closed again as another series of small tremors overtook her, then her eyes opened again. “I’m trying to fight it,” she said. “God help me, I want to fight it.”

  And at the sound of Connie Dowling’s voice Michelle broke through her temporary paralysis and approached the cot. She picked up the explosive device she’d left at the foot of the cot, feeling the weight of it in her hands as she stood up and looked down at her mother. Tears continued to stream down her face as she locked her eyes with mother’s. “Mom?”

  Connie Dowling looked at Michelle, her face struggling as Corporate Financial tried to take over. The light was going on and off in Connie’s eyes. “I’m trying to fight it...trying to...please...” Connie’s voice was raspy. “Help me...get these tendrils off and help me up. We’ll leave together...get your father, get him out, we’ll be a family again.”

  “Mother,” Michelle said, trying to stifle back the tears.

  “We’ll be a family again and it’ll be just like old times,” Connie Dowling said. She was smiling. “Remember how it used to be? Remember how things were when we were a family? Surely you remember the good times, don’t you?”

  “Oh, mother,” Michelle said, holding back the sorrow as she took a deep breath, now knowing what she had to do.

  Connie smiled wider as Michelle started to cry. “You remember! I knew you’d remember! Come...take these tendrils off. Help me...”

  “I love you, mother,” Michelle said and then she raised the explosive device high over her head and brought it crashing down onto her mother’s skull. There was a hearty crunch as the heavy end of the device smashed into her mother’s forehead.

  Connie Dowling went into convulsions and this time the tremors were different. They were those of a person with a serious head injury. Michelle dropped the explosive device she’d used to crush her mother’s skull with and scrambled back, stifling back a cry, part of her horrified at what she’d just done. God, I hope I did the right thing, omigod please I didn’t want her to suffer any more than she has to—

  Then Connie Dowling stopped thrashing about and was still.

  Michelle cried, slumped down into the corner, not knowing what to do now, only knowing that she had put her mother out of her misery and freed her spirit.

  HOLDING SUSAN VICKERS again was like going back in time.

  Susan was crying against his chest as he held her. Alan was crying, too. He couldn’t believe that he had let himself be taken in by this, that he had actually believed a corporate entity had manifested into a spiritual one.

  What had he been thinking?

  “Oh Alan,” Susan sobbed, holding him tightly. “I’m so sorry for everything. I’m so sorry.”

  Alan could only hold her, so overwhelmed with grief of what he had put himself through, for allowing his stressed-out imagination to get the better of him, to allow it to be fed by those whack-nuts from the Coalition and so happy to finally be here with her, to see that she’d changed for the better. She’d gone through this so they could have a happy life together. He saw that now.

  He was so overwhelmed with the emotions of seeing Susan Vickers again that he didn’t even notice the feathery sensations of the tendrils snaking out of Susan’s skin to make contact with his flesh.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  MICHELLE FOUGHT TO get control of her emotions. She held back her tears, wiped her eyes and cheeks with the back of her hand. Connie Dowling’s prone body lay on the cot, motionless. Michelle took a deep breath, fighting every emotion back down into a tiny place in her mind to be dealt with later. Right now she had a job to do and she had to finish it. She’d lost fifteen minutes in this immersion room. Any minute now Rachel would attempt to jam the signal in an attempt to wake her up. Instead, what she got was Rachel Drummond’s voice coming through the tiny speaker in her ear. “Michelle! Michelle! You okay?”

  “I’m fine,” Michelle said. Her throat was raw. “I’m getting out of here.”

  “My God, I heard everything!” Rachel said. For the first time, Rachel sounded scared. Michelle wiped the moisture of tears and sweat off on her pant suit and straightened herself up. “I tried jamming the signal but it had no effect. I couldn’t get past it!”

  “You did? You tried getting through to me?”

  “Yes. I tried several times. I kept hoping you would fight her, that—”

  “I killed her, Rachel. I killed my mother.” She felt dead, on the verge of crying again.

  “You set her free, Michelle,” Rachel said. “You know that, don’t you?”

  Michelle took a deep breath and looked at her mother’s lifeless body. “Yes,” she said. She couldn’t cry now. She had to regain her strength and get out of this.

  “You have to get out of there,” Rachel said. “Now!”

  “Affirmative.” Michelle picked up the briefcase and went to the door.

  “Michelle?”

  “Yes.”

  “I can’t raise Alan. He got caught.”

  Michelle stopped, suddenly feeling cold. “Corporate Financial got him?”

  “Yes, and they brought him down to the basement level. They sent his—”

  “I’ve got to get him,” Michelle said. She turned the doorknob to go out into the hallway.

  “No!” The tone of Rachel’s voice stopped her. “They sent his ex-girlfriend in. The one Corporate Financial snagged years ago. She’s completely fooled him. He broke down. He...” Rachel sounded upset, on the verge of tears. “He bought it, Michelle. He got suckered in by her, by them, and he broke down. I listened to the whole thing and I was trying to stop it. I kept trying to jam their signal but nothing went through. I even tried yelling into his ear and he didn’t respond. She got him, ensnared him, and now he’s under immersion. He’s totally under and there’s nothing we can do now. You have to get out of there.”

  “Oh my God,” Michelle moaned. She felt her knees turn rubbery.

  “Get out of there! Leave now!”

  The urgency in Rachel’s voice was strong and Michelle picked up the briefcase, and opened the door. “I’m leaving,” she said.

  She closed the door behind her and stepped into the darkened hallway just as she heard the elevator outside the immersion department open.

  A single pair of footsteps made their way out of the lobby and headed toward the immersion department.

  Michelle slipped back into her role quickly, fighting back her nervousness and fear, and walked calmly and purposefully toward the reception area. If it was Sam or Gary she already had a plan in mind.

  She met the figure walking into the immersion area just as she reached the still empty receptionist’s desk and was so into her role, had conditioned herself to look and act and sound wooden and unemotional, that she didn’t react visibly or emotionally w
hen she saw her father—dressed in an immaculate gray three-piece suit, looking every much like a powerful corporate CEO—smile and hold out his hand. “Ms. Dowling, I presume?”

  “Yes,” she said. She shook his hand, noting that in many ways he hadn’t changed at all since the last time she saw him over twelve years ago. If anything he looked even more slick and sinister.

  “I’m Frank Marstein,” Dad said, smiling.

  Michelle would have reacted visibly had she not prepared herself for this. Instead she nodded and said, “Pleased to meet you, sir. It’s an honor.”

  “I understand you came here for immersion training,” Frank Marstein said. His demeanor, his very presence, commanded power. His behavior was totally unlike the man she’d known when she was growing up. Dad had always been somewhat aloof and preoccupied with work, but his demeanor now was very different. “Mr. Greenberg and Lawrence recommended you very highly and I admit I was very pleased by your credentials and track record. Sam is in my office now with the rest of the executives. I came down to see how you were doing.” His smile diminished slightly. “Why are you out of the immersion room?”

  “I finished,” she said, keeping her voice wooden.

  Her father’s frown deepened. There was no sign of recognition that he was looking at his daughter. “I was led to believe Sam had just brought you in.”

  “I was here early,” she said. “He wanted to get me in early so I could attend your strategy meeting. I was just leaving to go upstairs. In fact, I have something for you.”

  “Oh?”

  “Last night I was going over the reports for Project Reign when I had an idea.” Her voice was crisp, business-like. “I drafted a report that I think you’ll want to see. I project that we can cut the production time of Project Reign down by half.”