Big Three-Thriller Bundle Box Collection

by Gordon Kessler

  I couldn’t help but rub the back of my head. I found a small, nearly unnoticeable line of scar tissue where my scalp had been cut and a portion of my skull had been temporarily removed for the operation. The idea of it gave me a sick sort of feeling in my gut.

  In the video, the person who was supposed to be me wore a hospital gown, with #374 printed in what was probably Magic Marker on the gown pocket. My head was bandaged still, but this time my nose and chin were taped, also — I guessed from fight injuries. With my eyes half open, I lay in a bed with other occupied beds around me. I was instructed to “get up,” by a voice off camera and I sat up. I was told to “stand up,” and I did this, also. My next command was to “come to me,” and this I did, moving closer to the camera, with halting sluggish steps.

  After leaving the room I’d been in for the hallway, I joined a number of others who were walking around the perimeter of the hall. “Follow them,” came the command, and I did so without hesitation, joining the others, walking in a large circle, aimlessly, like mental deficients in a psychiatric ward, a scene from Midnight Express. “Everyone. Arms out,” the man’s voice said, and what looked like fifty of these vegetative patients followed the command. These were the “vegetables” Rajiv had mentioned, the Mister Potato Heads.

  Yumi said, “Try the Sensory file.”

  I clicked on an .avi file, and what I saw made me cringe.

  In the video, it showed a man in a white hospital gown, head bandaged, face bruised, being led from the shadows to a metal chair in front of a projection screen in the middle of a room. His walk was stiff.

  “This — ” Yumi began.

  “I know, it’s me,” I guessed. I didn’t want to believe it, but I was becoming convinced. Still, I looked at the monitor skeptically, not one hundred percent sure. The idea of my mind being made into putty for shaping in any manner some deviant wanted, made me shiver.

  The camera came in for a close up as this man — me. I was seated. The subject on this film was a perfect twin if not me, yet I could not remember any of what I watched. The camera focus stayed on the profile, but zoomed out slightly while a video played on the screen. The assistant who brought in this blank me laid a box on a nearby table. From it, he withdrew a stuffed bird that looked like a mallard duck. On the video screen, it showed several ducks on a lake bank. He placed the duck in front of me and guided my hands to stroke it. “Duck,” he softly said. He then pulled back the wing and used my fingers to fan the feathers. “Feathers,” he said, again clearly and softly. He returned his stuffed friend to the box and pulled out an egg. The next scene on the screen showed hens in a hen house. One got up from her nest, revealing an egg. He placed the egg in my hand. “Egg,” he said and moved my thumb over the shell.

  I went forward in this file to a point where the assistant produced a pair of glasses — my glasses, apparently. He slipped them on me. He said, “These are your glasses. You are blind without them. You must wear them at all times when you are awake, except when bathing. Never leave them.”

  “Unmagnified glass,” Yumi said, “with a transponder inside the frames.”

  “Uh-huh,” I replied. “I’m ahead of you on that one.”

  Yumi said, “Both the Sensory and Practical learning portions of the project, although basic, are essential to the successful programming of the subject. We found without them, the subject has no solid ground in reality. That is why it was necessary for you to begin the day as if you had just awakened, then to proceed through a normal day in your new life. This practical experience helped to pull all of the programming we had done over the past two years into what you believed was your reality.”

  I scanned forward on the file and came to a part where the assistant was paging through a Time magazine laid in front of me. To the side were stacks of Sports Illustrateds, Readers’ Digests, Wall Street Journals, New York Times', Denver Posts, and even Gold Rush Gazettes.

  I glanced over my shoulder to Yumi. “This is unreal.”

  “I will give you a quick overview in simple terms about memory. The human memory can be divided into two basic types: implicit and explicit. Implicit memory is of common daily chores such as tying your shoes, walking, swimming and running, using a fork to eat mashed potatoes and a spoon for soup. It also contains identification of traffic signs, types of plants and animals, et cetera. However, no memory of specific people, faces or experiences exists there.

  “Those memories are held in the explicit part of the mind. They are like old movie reels. They easily deteriorate, crack and discolor. In a normal mind, they’re stored as movie film in a salt mine, sealed and protected so they last longer. These memories have been deteriorated, through a variety of what you might call brainwashing techniques — use of drugs and hypnotism. Your explicit memory has been erased. Such a thorough cleaning was necessary as actually to affect a small part of your implicit memories and that is why those memories were fortified with the sensory portion of your programming.

  “At the same time, you may have experienced brief reminiscences of your own true past coming to you as flashbacks. Those pieces of memories that were for some reason not erased by the drugs and hypnotic suggestion were mostly overwritten. If these fragments come to you, they will be like the cracked and distorted film, fuzzy around the edges, yellowed so badly they’re barely discernible. They will most likely happen as dreams or separations from reality that you will not find credible due to the stronger memories which have been implanted or programmed over them — replacing them.

  “However, some fragments of your true past might have been ingrained too strongly to destroy, due to traumatic experiences you may have had. These memories might flash like lightning through your thoughts.

  “For Xiang’s purposes, we wanted to make you as much of an average American as we could. That way, you would not rouse suspicion when you were let out among others of your kind. You did not need to think like a terrorist, or a sniper, or a warrior. There would be no reason and no evidence you did the things we would have you do. Nor would there be a way to trace you or your deeds back to us. And with the Brainistorm project in place and fully operating, anyone in the way would soon perish and only those who were thought beneficial would be in positions of power.”

  I selected the file called Clean.

  It showed a man sitting in a metal chair again. This time, he was completely naked and unconscious.

  Harvey said, Now, this guy is definitely you.

  I frowned, looking closer. Harvey was correct, at least, it did look like me.

  In the video a man in a blue lab coat jabbed a hypodermic needle into my arm. I rolled my head and slowly my eyes fluttered open. Still in the video, the lights in the room dimmed and Dr. Xiang stepped into view. He held a small flashlight and shined it into my eyes. Dr. Xiang began speaking softly. He gave his hypnotic suggestions. He instructed the terms of allegiance with me, in a familiar, gentle tone. He made me repeat, “True blue, trust them, do,” and “We’re lucky to have such a caring doctor, don’t you think?”

  Another file directly following the one I’d just viewed was labeled UnexpectedInteraction. This one was oddly out of place, and its contents piqued my curiosity.

  Inside the file, it showed me still in a white hospital gown while sitting in a chair. My head was still bandaged, but my face was no longer bruised. At my feet, a small animal skittered around. It stopped by my slipper and sniffed at me. It was a gerbil. Even though in the apparent vegetative state I was in, my eyes shifted downward to the small mammal. The scene cut to a new one of me eating. As I ate in a somber robot fashion like the rest of the blanks, I stuffed a cracker into my pocket.

  In the next scene, I was back at the chair, bandage no longer on my shaved head. The gerbil was below me on the floor. I slowly reached for my pocket and pulled out the cracker. Without apparent emotion or facial expression, I broke the cracker into small pieces and dropped it at my feet. The gerbil had a feast.

  The progression of the relatio
nship between Mickey Gerbil and me was recorded in six scenes that proceeded. The camera apparently followed our contact throughout my time of programming. In the last scene, my hair had grown out and the rodent was on my thigh, resting back on its haunches while munching on a piece of cracker, and I was smiling.

  “This was unusual,” Yumi said. “We found this interaction extremely interesting, exceptional. You were the only one who had any sort of mental reaction outside of the programming. That is why the gerbil became an important tool later.” Yumi pointed to a file.

  I clicked on it. The subfolder PracticalApplication, Initial.avi seemed blank. After a few seconds, a light came on to a split-screen scene I recognized as my bedroom and master bathroom. The time in the upper right hand corner said 06:00 AM.

  In the video, a woman I did not recognize entered the unoccupied bedroom. She wore a blue jumpsuit and carried a linen-filled basket to the foot of the coverless bed. She pulled a sheet from the basket and spread it on the bed. Soon several other people entered the bedroom, one pushing a wheeled coat rod filled with clothes on hangers, one with a hand truck loaded with shoeboxes. One came in with several bags, went to the dresser and began loading the drawers with socks and underwear.

  Dr. Yumi then appeared in the doorway, stepped to one side and seemed to be supervising. A woman came in carrying a basket and went to the bathroom, a man following with arms loaded with towels. As they finished in the bathroom, I was surprised to see Chief Dailey pop in. Yumi handed him something very small as he walked by. He went into the bathroom, took a bar of soap from the woman there. As the other two left, Dailey went directly to the shower. He unwrapped the soap, tossed the wrapper into the trash and looked about himself. After a pause, he stepped into the stall and with both hands carefully placed the soap into the shower caddy, then slipped something underneath it that I would have bet was what he’d just gotten from Yumi — the hastily scribed note I’d found under the bar. He went to the linen closet and took something from his pocket that looked like a small pouch. This time, what he held with both hands squirmed wildly. He set the pouch inside on the towels and opened it. Out came a small animal. Due to the distance from the camera, it wasn’t obvious, but I was sure it was Mickey.

  When Dailey left, Michelle came with another woman who assisted her in undressing. Michelle sat down naked at the make-up table and her assistant used a spray bottle to mist her back. After Michelle’s assistant left, two men brought a gurney in, with me on it. They carefully lifted me into place on the bed as Yumi watched. After they departed, Yumi checked her watch, stepped to the bedside, pulled a hypodermic from her lab coat and injected it into my neck. As my head slowly moved from side to side, Yumi stepped away and left through the doorway.

  Yumi said, “Those of us who were against the Brainstorm project did what we could to give you hints, things that would make you pause for thought. However, we were being watched as well as you were, so any suspicious movements in your home could have been scrutinized.

  “Fortunately, while this was being recorded, Dr. Xiang was waiting outside the house and not viewing. The technician in the control room who did have access, was one of my people. Do you remember the new toothpaste tube and toothbrush, the new soap? Normally, we would have left partially used props. We did not spritz the shower, only Michelle’s back. We did not scuff the shoes, we did not use laundered clothes, as was the usual case. Chief Dailey even left the gerbil you befriended when your mind should have been completely blank. We found an unusual amount of willpower in you, thoughts and memories too deeply ingrained to destroy. Xiang was excited about your potential.”

  An alarm went off from the hallway that took our attention from the computer monitor. It reminded me of a submarine dive alarm, and a voice came over the intercom speaker in the viewing room we occupied.

  “Security alert!” the voice said in a loud but calm voice. “Security alert! All essential personnel, report to the control center immediately!” The call repeated twice.

  “I must go,” Yumi said. “And you must return to the morgue and wait.”

  She removed a cell phone from her lab coat pocket and punched two keys. “This is Yumi, Dr. Xiang.” She glanced at me and motioned toward the door with her pistol.

  I got up but must have been moving too slowly for her because she waved the gun toward the door three more times, quickly.

  “Yes, Doctor,” she said over the phone. “I’ll be there immediately.” She pushed a button and dropped the phone back into her pocket. I slipped the helmet back on, and as I placed my hand on the doorknob, she said, “I must leave now. Essential personnel are evacuating.”

  I stepped away from the door and motioned for her to go first. “That’s good. I’ll be left home alone — to do what I need to do.”

  “Not exactly. Dr. Xiang and his core of scientists and technicians are leaving. That includes me. However, the guards, many of the doctors, assistants, patients and other personnel will be left behind to die when the bombs go off. They have no idea. I would guess at least a thousand people at Biotronics alone. The nuclear device in town will ensure the deaths of over four thousand there.”

  “My God! How can we stop the nukes?”

  “Impossible. The one at this facility is buried in fifty feet of concrete. Dr. Xiang has already remotely started the timer and it is irreversible.”

  “What can we do?”

  “For them, nothing. There is no way to get them all out in time. The devices are set to go off at sunrise, 05:46 this morning, five seconds apart. You have until then to find safe distance from the blast. Your helicopter is your only answer. I can no longer baby-sit you. You know the situation. You are now on your own.”

  In the swirl of her lab coat, and without the chance for further protest, Yumi left through the door.

  Chapter 29

  When I reentered the hallway, I placed my goggles over my eyes and walked guardedly back toward the morgue. I hoped Sunny would be awake, and between us we could figure out what to do about Gold Rush and Biotronics. Twenty feet from the morgue, a voice came from behind me.

  “Security.”

  Harvey said, Oh, shit! and I cringed inwardly. The voice sounded like Xiang’s. I kept going.

  The voice rose. “Security!”

  I stopped five feet from my destination.

  “Come here!”

  I turned slowly, but realized I needed to look the part I was playing or things would unravel very rapidly. I stepped quickly toward Xiang. He waited in front of the elevator next to two cabinets on wheels. Mike Wu stood next to him.

  As I approached, I nervously checked my copper-tinted goggles to make sure they were in place. They were. I tried to walk as militarily as possible to him and at five feet away, I stopped and stood at attention.

  Dr. Xiang said to Mike Wu, “Take these files to the truck. It’s waiting in the tunnel.”

  Tunnel? Harvey asked. There’s a tunnel?

  I wondered where it led.

  Dr. Xiang continued, “I’ll get Dr. Yumi, and we’ll bring the last two.” He turned to me. “Help Colonel Wu with these carts.”

  Colonel Wu, Harvey repeated. From captain of the high-school debating team to colonel — quite a jump.

  Why would they need a colonel at a newspaper? He’d worked at the Gold Mine Gazette since high school. Worked his way up to senior editor. In my reprogrammed mind he was no colonel, and his new title did not create new respect. He’d gotten a two-year degree as I had from Summit County Community College. His associates’ degree was in journalism. He’d never been in the military.

  The elevator doors opened, Dr. Xiang left down the hall, and I got behind one of the carts. I pushed it onto the elevator behind Mike Wu’s lead. I went to the back of the elevator car as the doors closed, and I tried to stay behind Wu. He took out a key and opened a small compartment above the elevator control buttons, which said Authorized Personnel Only. Inside were several additional buttons labeled Sub Floor 2 through Sub Floo
r 5. He poked Sub Floor 2. We were going to a level below the basement of the building.

  Wu didn’t speak to me, but he looked over his shoulder a couple of times. The second time I noticed he was looking at my name badge, the one that gave the name of the dead security guard.

  He watched the elevator doors as we descended, and I could tell he was thinking about me. He knew something was up, I was certain, and I could feel my head getting warm inside my helmet. I felt pressure at the back of my skull, and it pulsed to my temples. A low hum began, and the helmet vibrated.

  As the elevator made sub floor two, Mike Wu turned around to face me. His stare was wild and intense. I’d been found out. Moreover, not only was I endangered, but also Sunny and as well, Dr. Yumi for not killing us.

  The pressure inside my skull increased to the point of extreme pain, and I began panting. The copper-tinted goggles in front of my eyes started to glow. The hum turned into a roar, the vibrations becoming shakes and even our elevator car shuddered as the door opened. When the ballistic-resistant plastic shell of the helmet cracked, I could take no more. I yanked the helmet off and struck Wu with it in one motion. He caught most of the force when he defensively brought his hands up to his face, but still he fell through the open elevator doorway and onto the floor outside. I shoved the two carts from the elevator, and they toppled onto him, as I jabbed the first floor button.

  While the elevator doors closed, Wu was struggling to get out from underneath one of the heavy carts, and he yelled, “I’ll get you! You’re nothing compared to me. Your ass is mine, Weller!”

  Harvey said, Your magic sucks, ours rules! and my imaginary ally gave Wu the raspberry.

  As the elevator ascended, I fell back against the corner of the car and struggled for breath. Still on the floor of the elevator lay my helmet liner, exposed and separated from the cracked helmet shell. The liner was like some sort of copper fabric — thin, woven copper wire. I deduced the importance of the things. As Yumi had said, the copper stopped whatever kind of energy I exuded, the electrical field. It protected the brain of whoever wore it. In my case, it had contained the energy and turned it into something like a microwave oven on my brain. Between my power and Mike Wu’s equal or perhaps greater power, I’d nearly fried my own mind.