by Tim Waggoner
Poppy, as always, had dressed for the occasion. She wore her best pearls and an expensive—but tasteful—cream-colored dress with a pattern of red orchids and a darling pair of ankle-strap heels. She also wore an apron. These clothes were far too nice to risk getting any stains on them. Charlie sat at the counter, wearing a navy pinstripe suit, white shirt, and a gold tie. She thought the latter was an especially nice touch. He looked every inch the successful young businessman, if you overlooked the fact that one of his suit sleeves had been removed to make room for his robotic arm. She’d decided to call his look Corporate Terminator, and she thought it quite suited him.
Suited… get it? She almost laughed aloud at her own joke, but she knew it wouldn’t be appropriate.
To get the meeting started on the right note, she’d decided to serve her guests breakfast. After all, who didn’t love pancakes? She’d just finished the last batch and set the plate on the counter. She picked up a sugar shaker, sprinkled some on the pancakes, and then looked at the shaker with a grin.
“Didja see that study that came out?” she asked her guests. “Sugar’s eight times more addictive than cocaine. In the US, sugared drinks cause twice as many deaths as cocaine every year. And this stuff’s legal! Crazy, right?”
Time to get started, she thought. She removed her apron, draped it over a stool, and began speaking.
“I want to thank you all for joining me. I assure you that your long journeys from all ‘corners’ of the Circle have been worthwhile. Because tonight marks the beginning of a new age. For us all. As my global heads of sales, the Golden Circle has brought you untold wealth and power. And yet I suspect each of you feels as I do: imprisoned in a gilded cage. I can buy anything. And yet I have… nothing.”
Her guests exchanged looks of uncertainty, but Poppy continued, walking slowly behind the representatives as she spoke.
“You think I want to live out here under twenty-four hour guard? No. I’ll tell you what I want: I wanna be a law-abiding taxpayer. I wanna see a Broadway show. Shop on Rodeo Drive.”
She stopped behind the British representative, a handsome man in his fifties wearing a light blue suit and tie, dark blue socks, and shoes with a Union Jack design on them. She gripped his shoulders and started massaging them.
“Take a cute guy to a hot restaurant and screw his brains out in a nice hotel suite.”
Everyone laughed, the British rep most of all. Poppy smiled and gave the man’s shoulders a final squeeze before moving on.
“I wanna go to the Met Gala. The Oscars. Dinner at the White House. I wanna host The Apprentice. I want a normal life! I’m talking freedom, people. I’m talking legitimacy. I look around this room, and I see the most successful businesspeople in the world. And I want to see each of us get the kudos that we deserve!”
The representatives burst into applause, and Poppy smiled. She’d thought they might clap after that line. By this point, she’d made a complete circuit of the table, and was once more standing at its head.
“So say goodbye to the shadows, my friends. Because we’re about to step proudly into the spotlight.” She leaned forward and placed her palms on the table, her eyes shining with excitement. “And here’s how… Let’s go to the videotape.”
She directed everyone’s attention to the TV screen above the counter.
* * *
Eggsy sat slumped in one of the leather seats on Statesman’s private jet, scrolling through a text message conversation with Tilde on his phone, although conversation was stretching it a bit since most of the texts were from him.
EGGSY, PLEASE STOP TEXTING ME. I NEED SOME TIME TO THINK.
CALLING U NOW.
WHY AREN’T YOU PICKING UP?
BBY, I NEED TO TALK TO U
LEFT VOICEMAIL.
TRYING U AGAIN NOW.
Jack—back in his usual outfit—stood at the pool table, taking a few shots.
“You sure the Wi-Fi’s working?” Eggsy asked without looking up from his phone.
“Yup.” Jack sank the four ball in a side pocket before turning to look at Eggsy. “Only thing that ain’t working is your relationship. How about you put the damn cellphone down and clear your head for five minutes?”
Jack went to the rack, selected another cue stick, and held it out to Eggsy. He reluctantly put his phone in his trouser pocket and stood up to take it. Jack racked the balls, and they began to play. This time they decided to play rotation, and Jack let Eggsy take the first shot. Eggsy’s concentration was off, and he didn’t run the table like he had on the trip over, so the two of them took turns shooting as they spoke.
“She never ignored my texts before,” Eggsy said.
“You never told her before that you guys didn’t have a future,” Jack countered.
“But we would have! I mean… if I didn’t have to be a fucking prince. I love her.” He paused and then asked, “Haven’t you ever been in love?”
Jack had leaned over the table, ready to shoot, but he froze. For several seconds he remained motionless, not even breathing, but then he spoke. “Yeah. Once, a few years back. Didn’t work out.” He hit the cue ball and sent it rolling straight for the five ball. There was a loud clack as the balls bounced off one another, and the five rolled toward a corner pocket and sank in smoothly. Jack smiled, satisfied with the shot, and turned to Eggsy.
“Look, your girl’s doing you a solid. You’re only seeing the hole and not the donut, kid. Our line of work, we get to travel the world. Bang the hottest girls and blow straight outta town. Brand-new day, brand-new pussy. Wash, rinse, and repeat.” He turned back to the table and began looking for his next shot.
“To the old me, that would’ve sounded pretty damn good,” Eggsy said.
Jack didn’t have a good shot at the six ball. He gave it a try, but all he managed to accomplish was to rearrange the pattern of balls on the table. It was Eggsy’s turn, so Jack stepped back and continued talking while Eggsy contemplated how he was going to sink the ball.
“No fights, no meet-the-folks, no trying your best to change. No Achilles heel threatening your security as a spy. Just a whole lotta action. If it don’t sound good to you now, you ain’t thinking about it hard enough.” He paused, and then added, “If Harry was here, he’d be giving you the exact same advice.”
Eggsy had no more luck sinking the six ball than Jack did. He stepped back from the table and turned toward his fellow spy.
“Maybe,” he allowed.
“‘Hop on the bus, Gus,’” Jack said.
Eggsy frowned. “What?”
“It’s a song,” Jack said. “I used to play it a lot back when Champ helped me through some tough times a while ago. It’s ‘Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover’ by Paul Simon.”
“I don’t think I know it,” Eggsy said.
Jack took out his phone, called up his music app, and selected the song. His phone was tied into the plane’s sound system, and when music began issuing from the cabin’s speakers, Jack sang along.
Eggsy found this impromptu performance more than a little weird, but it was nice to see Jack let go and not be so serious for a change, and he smiled at the absurdity of it all.
“Yeah. No. I… don’t know it,” he said awkwardly.
When the song ended, Jack looked at Eggsy with an expectant grin.
“I promise you’ll feel better once I get you some southern comfort. And I ain’t talking about liquor.”
Eggsy smiled, caught up in Jack’s enthusiasm.
“Lick her? I’d love to. Long as she licks me back afterward.”
They laughed.
* * *
When the video ended, Poppy looked at the sales reps gathered around the table, and tried to gauge their reactions. After a moment, they broke into anxious, muted applause. A less enthusiastic response than she’d hoped for, but not bad. She smiled as if they’d given her a standing ovation.
“Any questions?” she asked.
Silence. Some of the reps exchanged glances, but no on
e spoke. Then finally, the British man with the Union Jack shoes stood.
“Uh… I’m sorry to say this—” he began.
“Hi, ‘Sorry to Say This.’ I’m Poppy!”
A smattering of nervous laughter came from the group. Not from the British man, though. He looked as if he might be ill.
“Just messing with you,” Poppy said to him. Then to the others, “Team, this is Boris Batko, Southeast Asia.” She turned to Boris and nodded. “Go ahead, Boris.”
“Madam Poppy… You say that where America leads, other nations follow. But what if they don’t? How are we protected?”
Poppy pursed her lips in irritation, but before she could respond to Boris, a second man stood. He was shorter than the Brit and dressed more conservatively in a black suit, white shirt, and black tie. He was balding, which was probably why he’d grown his goatee and mustache, Poppy thought. She didn’t think black was a good choice for the man. Made him look too much like a mortician.
“Madam Poppy? Boris is right. And already this plan of yours is underway! What if we did not wish to be involved?”
Poppy had to fight to keep from gritting her teeth as she spoke next. “For those who don’t know, this is Grigor. Eastern Europe.” She faced the man and spoke to him gently. “You can still opt out, Grigor. Would you like to opt out?”
Grigor looked to his fellow sales reps for support, but none would meet his gaze. He turned back to Poppy and swallowed nervously. “I… I think yes.”
Poppy nodded, smiled, and then she placed two fingers in her mouth and whistled.
Bennie and Jet burst out of their kennels and came racing across the diner toward Grigor. The man shrieked in terror and ran for the exit. Poppy didn’t think he would make it, but he was a lot faster than he looked, and he managed to get outside before the robot dogs caught up to him. He didn’t get much farther, though. Bennie and Jet raced after him, and a few seconds later, everyone heard screaming combined with the tearing of flesh. The screaming didn’t last long, but the dogs continued ripping Grigor’s corpse apart. Bennie and Jet might be artificial constructs, but her babies needed regular exercise just like real animals (which Poppy thought of as meatimals) in order to keep their programming sharp.
“Ooh!” she said. “They’ve made a real dog’s dinner of him.”
The dogs—and what little remained of Grigor—could be seen clearly through one of the diner’s windows. Copious amounts of blood were splashed all over the ground, and Bennie and Jet had gotten quite a bit of the red stuff on them as well. She’d have to have Charlie give them a clean later.
She looked at her sales representatives. They were all gazing upon the carnage outside the window, eyes wide, faces pale, bodies trembling. Poppy smiled. This was more like it.
“Anyone else?” she said. “How about you, Boris? Any more questions?”
Boris had remained standing throughout as Grigor suffered his grisly demise, but he quickly shook his head and practically flung himself back into his chair. The other reps turned to look at her and slowly, fearfully, shook their heads.
Poppy clapped her hands together, and the sudden noise made the reps jump.
“Great!” she said. “Then we’re ready to go public!”
She turned to Charlie, who was still sitting at the counter, now looking a little queasy. Funny, he could kill without so much as batting an eye—witness how easily he’d snapped Angel’s neck—but when it came to spilling a little blood, okay, a lot of blood, he became downright squeamish. People could be so inconsistent. That was one of the reasons she preferred machines. As long as they were well maintained, they did exactly what they were designed to do. You could always depend on them. People? Not so much.
But machines had limitations, and Bennie and Jet were no exception. They could kill as savagely as any animal on earth, but they had no need to consume their prey. Because of this, they tended to leave some nasty messes lying around.
Before Poppy could say anything to Charlie, he sighed deeply, as though reading her mind, hopped off his stool and headed out to find a body bag.
Good boy.
* * *
Eggsy ran down the hall toward Harry’s cell. When he’d returned to the distillery, Merlin had filled him in on Harry’s progress regaining his memory. Or, rather, lack thereof. Everyone—Champ, Ginger, even Merlin—had decided Harry was a lost cause. But Eggsy wasn’t ready to give up on Harry yet.
The door was open, and as Eggsy entered the room, he saw Harry standing next to his bed, packing his meager belongings into a small bag. Eggsy watched him for several seconds. He didn’t even move like Harry Hart. Harry had moved with a calm, almost zen-like assurance. He’d been a man completely at home in his own skin, who knew who he was and what he had to do at all times. This Harry didn’t behave anything like that. His movements were tentative, hesitant, as if he wasn’t quite sure of anything. It broke Eggsy’s heart to see him like this.
Eggsy leaned back and knocked on the open door to announce his presence. Harry looked up, wary at first, as if he thought someone had come to perform another awful test on him. Eggsy had heard about those tests and how they’d turned out. But since Eggsy wasn’t Merlin or Ginger, Harry smiled and gestured for him to enter.
Eggsy walked over to Harry and extended his hand. “Harry.”
They shook hands, and Harry looked at Eggsy, frowning slightly. Eggsy felt a stab of sorrow when he realized Harry was struggling to recall his name.
“It’s Eggsy,” he supplied.
Harry frowned. “Eggy? I should have remembered. Most unusual name.”
Eggsy didn’t bother to correct him. Harry released his hand and returned to his bed.
“What’s going on?” Eggsy asked.
“Just packing.” He removed a couple of bottles from his bag and held them up for Eggsy to examine. “Look at these lovely toiletries Merlin very kindly gave me as a leaving present. Try this Kingsman aftershave.” He unscrewed the top of the aftershave bottle and sniffed. “Kingsman. Wonderful!” He held it out for Eggsy to try.
Eggsy managed a faint smile. “I know. It’s my brand too.” He paused, trying to find the words to express what he wanted to say. “Harry… you can’t give up now.”
“Give up? Au contraire.” Harry put the top back on the aftershave and returned the bottle to his bag. “I’m about to achieve my dream. Researching rare butterflies alongside some of the finest minds in entomology.”
“You won’t find a more interesting butterfly than me, Harry.”
Harry gave Eggsy a quizzical look. “Sorry?”
“When we first met… I was just a maggot.”
“Maggots turn into flies,” Harry said, not unkindly. “Perhaps you mean ‘larva?’”
“Larva. Whatever. Point is, everyone wanted to crush me underfoot. But not you. You helped me grow into a caterpillar. Now I have wings. I’m flying higher than I ever dreamed. And it’s all thanks to you.”
This seemed to take Harry aback somewhat. “I’m… pleased to have been part of your transformation. Honored.”
“You can’t just walk away,” Eggsy said. “Kingsman needs you. And… so do I.”
Harry looked at Eggsy and smiled sadly. “Eggy, whoever the Harry was that you knew… he’s gone, I’m afraid. And I… need to finish packing and get some sleep.”
What else was there to say? People had the right to choose their own paths in life, didn’t they? Who was he to stand in Harry’s way? Even if this Harry wasn’t his Harry. They couldn’t keep holding the man against his will in hope that one day the real Harry Hart would wake up inside. And how long might that take? Weeks? Months? Years? Forever? This Harry could spend his whole life in captivity, and die here, without ever knowing freedom, without being allowed to live. Eggsy couldn’t do that to him.
* * *
Depressed after his talk with Harry, Eggsy decided he needed to get out for a while. He drove into the nearest town and stopped at the first bar he came to, a local dive called
, appropriately enough, Shitkickers. He sat at the bar and ordered a martini. A few moments later, the bartender sat a shot of whiskey in front of him.
“That ain’t a martini,” Eggsy said.
“It is in Kentucky,” the bartender replied, then stepped away to tend to another customer. Eggsy stared at the drink miserably, remembering the time Harry had taught him how to mix the perfect martini.
A dry vermouth is essential, and despite what Mr Bond says in the movies, stirring is always preferable to shaking. It allows one more control over the final product. When he finished, he raised his glass. Here’s to you, Eggsy. You’re exactly what Kingsman needs.
But that Harry was gone for good. His body might be alive, but the person inhabiting it wasn’t him. Or at least, not all of him.
He decided to check his voicemail in the hope that Tilde had finally called him back. He took out his phone, and paused for a moment to gaze sadly at the picture of Tilde and JB that served as the device’s wallpaper. Calling his voicemail, he listened to a recorded voice say, “You have NO new messages.” He sighed heavily.
He pulled Tilde’s name up from his contacts list, and wrote her a text.
BABE I’VE NEVER NEEDED U MORE THAN NOW. I LOVE U. HOPE UR OK.
He hit send and then sat staring at the screen, whiskey untouched.
Stockholm, Sweden
Tilde lay on her bed, the nameless little pug curled up beside her. The puppy wasn’t sleeping, though. Its eyes were wide open and watching her intently, as if it knew she was upset but didn’t know what to do about it. Her face was wet with tears, and she was fighting to keep from crying again. It seems that’s all she did now: cry. She wasn’t upset because Eggsy might’ve slept with that slut whose picture he’d sent her. She hoped he hadn’t, of course. What really hurt was that she’d thought Eggsy loved her enough to commit to their relationship. But he obviously didn’t. And part of it—so he claimed—was because she was a princess, destined one day to be queen of her country. But she couldn’t help that! She’d been born into the royal family. She’d spent her whole life trying to live in two worlds: one, the world of a princess, with all of its duties and responsibilities, and the other, the world of a regular girl. Someone who wasn’t special because of who her mother and father were, but because of who she was. Someone who had her own thoughts and ideas, her own dreams, who didn’t have to worry about protocol or the potential national and international repercussions of her actions. That was why she had this apartment in the city. It was a place where she could go and be just plain Tilde, princess be damned. It was a small place—a living area, kitchenette, bathroom, and bedroom—but it was hers.