Regina's pushing ahead with her plan to talk Brian down from his nano-induced rage, though. “Baby, we're looking for the doctor. We're going to find him. But we didn't want to leave you out here alone. We were worried about you. I was worried about you. I still am.”
“You think I don't know that?” snarls Brian, anger and frustration dripping from his voice. “I wanted to tell you! This was the only way I could handle it! And it was fine until HE started getting closer! I was FINE out here, and then he brought in his filth and the whole thing decayed around me like I was drowning in year-old dumpster garbage!”
Without thinking, I respond. “Dude, I was j–”
“SHUT! UP!” roars Brian, and twenty feet to my left a hand bursts through a section of the store wall.
For a split second, the dust-covered hand sticks out alone, a wall-hanging put up by someone with a morbid sense of humor. Then the drywall around it begins to melt away like plastic held up to a blowtorch, disappearing rapidly in all directions. Metallic clangs ring out as half-dissolved shelves fall to the ground before vanishing in their own turn.
Within seconds, the hole is big enough to admit an entire person. Striding out of the gloom comes Brian, a murderous look on his face. His shoulders are hunched, his forehead lowered, and his teeth bared behind a snarl big enough to cause him to drool slightly.
However, the very first thing I notice about Brian is that he's completely naked. From head to toe, he doesn't have a stitch of clothing on. The nanos coat his entire body, giving him a sheen that shimmers slightly in the beams of our flashlights. I've seen this on my own hands when Dr. A drove me to my wit's end, but this is far more extreme.
“All you had to do!” Brian shouts, stalking toward me one deliberate step at a time. “Was find! Dr. A!” His breath is coming in short pants, his nostrils flaring with each inhalation. His hands clench into fists over and over again, hard enough that I can hear the knuckles popping in one of them. The silvery nanos drip off of his hands, eating small holes in the carpet where they land.
He steadily closes the distance with a strange bobbing walk, and after a few steps I realize why. With each step, the floor beneath him is dissolving, lowering him gently through the carpet, thin padding and cement with equal ease. Small craters, still slowly expanding, mark the path he's taken so far.
Brian's still drawing closer. “You know what this does to people, you imbecile. You know! And yet you came here! You did this to me! Look at me!” He gestures violently at himself, and I suddenly realize that he's only a few steps away from being able to touch me.
I jump backwards, hands up in a placating gesture. “It's cool, man. I'll leave.”
Brian snarls without words and spits on the ground, still advancing as I retreat. Regina steps forward, fear and concern in her eyes, and puts herself between the two of us.
“Brian, stop!” she pleads. “You know Dan's your friend. You're better than this.”
Brian stops and stares her dead in the eyes. “You?” he asks incredulously. “You of all people? You'd stand here and tell me just to resist this, to out-think it?”
“Yes, me. You can beat this!”
“I recall a city-swamping storm. Lightning drawn down, incautious of bystanders. A museum in wreckage. All of this spanning days, weeks because you knew, like an itch on your brain itself, that he was out there!”
Throughout this speech, Brian has been sinking slowly into the floor. Stepping up almost a foot to get out of the holes he's creating, he resumes his advance.
“Bri, please, stop. You're right. I know exactly how this feels. That's why I can help you. And we're going to, I promise. We're going to help you.”
“Regina,” I caution.
Brian growls deep in his throat. “Don't you even say her name. I won't hear you corrupt it.”
I reach for Regina's arm to pull her back with me, but she shakes off my grip.
“Brian, come on,” she begs him, ignoring me. “Come with me. Doc Simmons has sedatives. We're gonna get this under control.”
He shakes his head, then again violently, as if trying to shake it clean. “No. No! There are two ways to control this. He could have found the cause. I wanted to do it that way, you know? I tried. I tried so hard.
“But now he's here, and we're doing it the other way. This all stops when I wipe the Earth of your disgusting presence. Dan.” He spits my name like a curse, steps out of the new holes he's standing in, and starts forward once more. Regina is now only a few feet from him, but his eyes are fixed over her shoulder on me.
“Get out of my way, Regina,” he says, but she shakes her head and reaches out a hand. I make a strangled noise in my throat, afraid to say anything that'll set Brian off.
“Please, Bri?” asks Regina.
Brian makes an incoherent noise, halfway between a sob and a shout, and tears a piece of metal shelving from the wall. He juggles it briefly as it immediately begins to dissolve in his hands, catches it in a temporarily solid grip and swings it like a bat at Regina.
The makeshift weapon slams into her shoulder, driving her into the wall. She hits the shelves with a cry and stumbles to her knees. The shelf falls from Brian's hands, fist-sized holes rapidly expanding through it from where he grasped it.
Brian locks eyes with me and points at Regina. “Look what you made me do! You ruin things. You ruin everything!”
I want to help Regina, but backing up seems the most prudent action at this point. It draws Brian away from her, which honestly seems to be the most helpful thing I can do right now.
Weighing my options briefly, I decide to risk his further ire by talking, just to keep his attention on me. “C'mon, man. That's the nanos talking. You don't want to do this.”
“Is it? Dan?” He uses my name as an epithet again. “Is it really? How good a friend are you? How good a person are you?”
He advances relentlessly, and I back up to keep pace. I don't have too many more steps to go until I'm up against the back wall of the store, and I definitely need to turn before that happens.
“Dude, you're my best friend.”
“Yeah. I am. And what do I get out of it? Danger. Pain. Physical damage. Mental anguish. LOOK AT ME RIGHT NOW!” he roars. “You! This is because of you! You use people! You wad them up and throw them away like they're garbage, but it's you! You're the trash! You're the filth!”
With eyes wide and spittle flying from his mouth as he delivers this diatribe, Brian's attention is completely on me. At this moment, Doc Simmons steps from one of the aisles behind Brian, a syringe in her hand, and in one smooth motion jabs it into his neck and depresses the plunger.
Brian roars, and for one moment, I think that it's worked. Then I see the liquid sheeting briefly down his neck and shoulder before being consumed by the ravenous nanos, even as the doc drops the disintegrating syringe.
The doc has immediately started moving away again, but Brian lashes out with a backhanded blow and catches her across the chest with his bare arm. I cry out, “No!” as the nanos set in, but the doc is already tearing off her coat and throwing it away from her. It falls to the ground as a ragged scrap of fabric, but as far as I can tell she got it off before anything spread.
“You see?” growls Brian, turning back to me. “Everyone! You put everyone in harm's way, while you just watch and let it happen. This ends now!”
On that final word, he lurches into a run at me, and I abandon backing up in favor of an all-out sprint away. I skid around the corner and turn up another aisle, heading back for the front of the store in an effort to get out of this dark and maze-like shop. I hear a crash behind me and I risk a look back.
Brian has stumbled while running and fallen into a shelf, which is collapsing around him. Judging by the enraged shouting, he's not hurt, just entangled, but it's bought me a bit more of a lead.
Probably I should take advantage of this to get to the open atrium of the mall, but I really don't want to leave Regina and Doc Simmons in here with Bria
n. No matter what he's said, I don't just use people. I don't.
So instead of making my escape, I double back toward Brian. I duck low as I go, running my hand all along the main piece of the shelving unit as I pass by. I can feel the metal pulling away from my fingers, a crawling sensation, and by the time I'm halfway down the aisle I can hear the creak of the shelf starting to give way.
Brian's nearly free of the shelf that's fallen on him now, and is lying in a pit almost two feet deep. As the shelf behind me collapses, I break into a full run and leap over the pit. Brian springs up to try to grab me, and is hit by the falling shelf and driven back into the deepening pit.
I land on the far side and stumble. My moment of triumph changes quickly to horror as I feel my right shoe eroding beneath me. Brian must have gotten a hand on me on the way by! In a panic, I stomp on my heel with my other foot and kick my shoe off, sending it flying. In an utter coincidence, just as Brian is raising his head from the wreckage of the latest shelf, the steel-toed boot strikes him directly in the face, snapping his head back and knocking him over with a crash.
Still panicked, I shine my flashlight on my foot, but see no sign that the nanos made it through, or transferred to my other shoe. I take in a deep, shaky breath and step carefully toward Brian, who's currently lying on a pile of rubble. The whole pile is shifting and collapsing beneath him as the nanos disintegrate it, and I can't tell if Brian is moving or not.
Shining my light on him, I see no signs of direct movement. “Doc, where are those –” I begin, but my question is cut off by a scream of rage from Brian. He sits up, bleeding from the nose and with a black eye already forming, and whips his hand at me like he's snapping an invisible towel. A spray of nanos flies off and strikes me, hitting my shirt, my pants, and worst of all, directly landing on my exposed hands and face.
It feels like being branded. I scream as points of bloody pain erupt all over my body.
My skin boils away under the nanos' invasive touch. Every nerve ending flares as it dies, sending continuous waves of pain from half a dozen different places on my skin. I scrabble frantically at my jacket, trying to use the fabric to wipe away the destroying nanos, but the fabric disintegrates in my hands.
Brian's laughing wildly with a hysterical tinge to his voice. I stumble around a corner to avoid any further damage, as if it really matters. The agony jolting through my body, growing worse with every step, confirms that I've had it. I'd like to say that I feel noble for my sacrifice, or at least resigned to my fate, but what I really feel is intense, all-consuming fear. I don't want to die, and especially not like this.
Through the haze of pain, I hear Doc Simmons yelling. “Dan! Hate the nanos!”
Weird advice. Hardly advice at all, honestly. Of course I hate them. Due to these stupid things, I've suffered incredible amounts of physical and mental abuse. I've been beaten, shot, stabbed, burned, electrocuted and more. I've been under investigation by the police, and fired from several jobs. I've had my car totaled, my home broken into, my personal sanctity violated in every way imaginable. Also the majority of the city regards me with the same vague sort of hate that's directed at suspected terrorists shown on the evening news.
And now I'm dying at the hands of my best friend, and that's also laid at their feet. So yeah, I hate the nanos. If I could rip every one of them out of my body, I would. I'd give up every benefit I've gained from them – the extra strength, the improved cognition, the minor lingering powers – just to watch them burn. When I was normal, I thought I'd like to be exceptional. But having given that a try, let me tell you: it sucks.
- Chapter Ten -
“Dan! Are you still alive?” calls Simmons, and I realize with some astonishment that I am. I've dropped my flashlight and I can't see my hands in the dim recesses of the store, but they don't seem to be disintegrating any more. The open wounds on the back make me hiss in pain when I brush them, though, and blood is running freely down my fingertips. A trickling wetness on my neck tells me that the same is probably true of my face. Both of my eyes are still working, although blood is dripping into the left one. I blink it away.
“I – I am!” I shout back, incredulous. This is met by a gargled roar from Brian in the next aisle, and the sound of shifting metal.
“For now!” he shouts, and I quickly shove the shelf I'm standing next to. It topples over with a clamorous crash, eliciting another shout of pain from Brian. I can hear him moving even as the shelving dissolves around him, so I know it's only a short reprieve.
“I'm...going to...kill...you all,” pants Brian, clawing his way out of the rubble.
“Listen to yourself!” I shout at him. Shouting causes a searing pain from my left cheek, and something's flapping there like it's been torn, but I shove that down for now. “I don't care what poison thoughts you've got in your system, man. You're better than this. You need to come after me, fine, but there's nothing turning you against the doc and Regina.”
“Don't say her name!” he growls. His head and shoulders are clear of the fallen shelves, and he's clambering out of the pit that's been forming beneath him. His fingers dig into the floor, cutting brief handholds that rapidly widen into small craters of their own.
“Then don't threaten her!”
“They're helping you!” He's almost free now, and I'm backing up quickly.
“Not now they're not. They're in a corner of the store, and I'm here in front of you. You want me? Come on, then. But leave them out of this.”
Brian lunges for me, and I break and run. My shredded clothing flutters as I go, and the rushing wind from my progress sings white-hot over my wounds. With every step, I'm certain I'll feel Brian leap onto my back and bear me to the floor, nanos eating into my spine, but somehow I make it to the front of the store unharmed.
I burst free of the confines of the shop and rush into the atrium's light. My hands, legs and face burn where the skin's been eaten away, my jacket and shirt look like I took a shotgun blast at close range, and air is whistling in my cheek as I pant for breath. I'm slightly light-headed, and I've lost enough blood that I can actually smell it on me, a rich meaty stink.
I should run. I should hide. I'm in no position to fight. And what can I do against him, anyway? The whole plan was to come out here and either talk him down or catch him by surprise so that we could sedate him. There's no scenario where I'm going to hurt him. I mean, I did drop a couple of shelves on him, but I’m talking about serious hurt. Nano-disassembly-level hurt. It's not happening. I'll let him kill me first.
I'm really hoping it doesn't come to that, though.
“Brian!” I call, turning around to face the store. I can see him inside, walking slowly toward me. “Come on! I'm out here!”
“Shut up,” Brian snarls, and although his voice quivers with rage, his tone is quiet and his steps are measured. “Just stop talking. I can just about hold it together when you shut up.”
His arms are wrapped tightly around his stomach, and at first I'm afraid he's been hurt. Then he steps out of the store and into the daylight streaming in through the windows high above, and I realize that he's just trying to keep his hands under control. Brian's knuckles are white from where he's gripping his own arms so hard, and he shines with the silvery glitter of nanos looking for something to destroy.
“You're not wrong, you know,” Brian says, pacing around me, his steps still eating holes in the floor as he goes. I stand still, tense and ready to spring, unsure whether running will break his fragile hold on calm. His speech is tight with fury and delivered through occasionally clenched teeth, but he seems to have himself under control for now.
“This isn't me. I know that. I know! And I can appreciate what they were trying to do for me. Not you!” He laughs. “Not you. Can't appreciate anything about you. I can remember things I liked, but they've all got a new spin on them. Tainted, like I can finally see the way you really meant everything.”
I must have looked like I was about to say something, because Br
ian shoots one finger up, pointing at me in an accusatory fashion. “Not one word! If you say one thing, I will tear you apart right here. I won't even need the nanos. I'll do it with my hands. And I'll laugh while I'm doing it.”
I nod, and kneel down. While Brian watches curiously, still pacing, I draw a vertical line in the tile at my feet. I'd meant to just write in the dust, but my nanos are apparently still in high gear, as I end up etching directly into the tile itself. I shrug and continue. It'll be easier to read this way anyway.
As Brian makes another circuit, I carefully continue my marks. Writing upside down so that it'll be facing out toward Brian, I draw: I'M SORRY.
He stops in front of me, barely out of arm's reach, and looks me directly in the eyes. Then, incredibly, he starts to laugh. It's still got more than a touch of hysteria, but it's a real laugh, with humor behind it.
“Yeah,” he says between laughs. “That's perfect.”
His fists are clenched at his sides, and although he's still chuckling, he's also crying. For a second, I'm sure he's about to jump onto me, and I brace myself for the tearing impact. But instead, he kneels down too and closes his eyes.
“Doc!” he shouts. “Come and trank me now. Do it quickly!”
Simmons materializes out of the shadows of the store, a new syringe already in hand, and stabs the point into Brian's shoulder. Just as before, though, the needle disintegrates on contact, metal flaking and falling away as the sedative spurts out of the ruined syringe, only to be consumed in its turn by the voracious nanos.
“You've got to turn that off, Brian,” the doc says authoritatively, but Brian shakes his head.
“Can't. It's taking all I've got to keep things even this calm,” he grits out. “Figure something out. And hurry!”
The doc digs through her bag. “All right. On the count of three, tilt your head back, open your mouth and pretend you're about to chug a beer.”
I raise an eyebrow at the doc, and she shrugs as she holds several pills over Brian's head. “Seemed like the best way to tell him to open his throat. I don't know how thorough this nano coating is. One, two, three!”
Everything Falls Apart Page 10