Dream Static

by Robert S. Wilson

  Chapter 14

  Angela wakes up tied to a chair, mouth taped shut. Barton stands over her, a long knife in his hand pointed down at her, an expression much more of anger than humor now. He kneels down in front of her and pokes at her collar gently with the point of the blade. "We wouldn't even be here if you hadn't gotten so goddamn curious and sent that little pretty boyfriend of yours out on a wild goose chase for the mysterious Nashville Court Bomber.

  "We could both be working together to make this world a better place. But no... you had to go and put your nose where it doesn't belong. So, now, here we are. Only not for much longer. In a little while, once I have what I need, I'll be alone again and that's unfortunate, but I can live with it.

  "It sucks though, we really were on the same side, even if you probably won't admit that now. Johnson was also on the same side. We made a great team, he and I. He had a knowledge of explosives, I had a means to get inside the court buildings, and well... we both had the determination to make a real difference. But you wouldn't know what that's like, would you, Miss Bane?"

  He slides the knife down along her shoulder and down her arm and then across her chest, careful to slide it perfectly along the curves of her breasts. "But Johnson got a bit too zealous and I was starting to make more progress from a place of power. He didn't like the lack of body count that came with making progress that way, so I put an end to that complication. But I'm getting ahead of myself... first there was you and what's his name? Dayton? Denton? Draper? Oh whatever, it doesn't matter now. He's fucking dead and here in a minute you will be too."

  He slides the blade up to her neck. "What I need to know from you is how in the fuck did you manage to get your contract with Immortal Coil extended when you were fucking dead? Huh?"

  He looks into her eyes with an honest curiosity blended with fury. "Well?"

  Angela shakes her head left and right.

  "Oh yeah, I suppose there's a matter of your sealed mouth to deal with." He reaches forward and rips the tape from her mouth in an excruciatingly long and rough pull as the wrapped tape gives a bit of a fight. Angela screams immediately and just as quickly Barton punches her in the face with one good hard deck.

  She sits there afterward, body leaning on the ropes holding her back, lip busted and bleeding. Barton screams at her, "Well, are you going to tell me what I want to know or am I going to have to drag this out all fucking night? Trust me, you don't want that. I can be your friend, I can make it quick and painless but if I have to drag it out, you're going to feel every kind of pain imaginable and it's going to feel like an eternity, do you fucking hear me?"

  Angela is sobbing again, trying to work her lips into words that probably aren't going to help her anyway, but she manages to blurt out something akin to syllables, "I bone boe."

  "I'm sorry, I'm not sure I heard you right. It sounded like you might have said, 'I don't know' but I know you're not that fucking stupid, so let me give you another chance here. I'll start over. Why did you of all people end up on that operating table? Who paid Immortal Coil to bring you back? Someone fucking had to do it and it sure as hell wasn't you because you were fucking dead as I said before." He brings the knife up to her face then and lets the blade slide just a thin sliver into her flesh up the side of her cheek. She's breathing harder than she ever has in her life and blood is dribbling down in a thin line from the slit he's making in her face. She takes a deep breath and pulls her lip up to try and speak more clearly though she knows it's not what he wants to hear.

  "I don't know who did it. I don't know and I don't know why."

  Barton brings the blade up taking a chunk of her hair from her head and just as quickly throws her a punch with his other hand. This time it hits her cheek bone just above the slice in her skin and she feels something jar in her vision.

  "I don't know, I swear!" she screams.

  "I don't have patience for this, Miss Bane. It's only going to get worse for you the more you lie to me."

  "I'm not lying, I swear, I don't know, I tried to find out at the hospital and no one would give me a straight answer. Please, you have to believe me."

  "No, Miss Bane, you're not getting the bigger picture. I don't have to believe anything. Do you think I'm fucking stupid?"

  Barton takes her left arm and pulls it out from the restraints just enough to bare a portion of her flesh. He leans down and slides the knife along the length of her forearm leaving a long gash that immediately begins to gush blood. Angela nearly faints from the dizziness that comes from that open bleeding wound but she manages to stay somewhat alert.

  "Now... You're going to have a very hard time surviving this and ultimately, once your dead, I'll make sure you don't pop up again and make more fucking trouble. So why not just get it over with and tell me what I want to know and I'll make it go quicker, even give you a little something to make it nice and warm and fuzzy. Yeah?"

  Angela's face is a contorted mess of blood, phlegm, and slobber. "I really don't know anything. I just don't, I don't I don't I don't." She begins to wail with emotion. Her arm is split open, a man she's grown to care strongly about lies possibly dead, and a man she thought was one of the last great human beings is torturing her and revealing himself to be a murderer—her murderer no less—and he's about to kill her all over again.

  Barton sighs. "You know what, Miss Bane, I think you just might be telling me the truth."

  Angela sits there, head hanging in utter hopelessness.

  "It's too bad really, because I can't be sure and I'm just going to have to continue to drag this out, I guess. So, if you are telling me the truth, please do forgive me for what I'm about to do." He smiles and leans forward with the knife again and right as his blade is hovering just over her flesh, there's a loud crash from somewhere outside. Their eyes meet for a moment and Barton smiles. "You wait right here, Miss Bane."

  He walks toward the front entrance, turns back for a moment and smiles.

  Gunfire erupts from somewhere on the far end of the building, blasting its way toward the place where Barton stands. He ducks down, pulls out his own gun and begins to return fire.

  ***

  Gunfire lighting up the otherwise darkened room around her, Angela puts all her strength into trying to pull at the ties that hold her hands behind her back. No dice. She pulls and pulls and screams with the pain of it. Still it doesn't give. Down beside her feet she can see Maddox's body lying still and she works up the courage to try something else. She begins rocking the chair side to side over and over again. The chair begins to sway as she pivots back and forth. The dizziness of her bleeding forearm nearly sends her careening down a kaleidoscope of blurry darkness, but she fights it and then the world tumbles out from under her and she finds herself lying on the floor facing Maddox's shoulder.

  She's just about to try pulling at her restraints again when a sudden succession of footsteps come up behind her and there's a tug on her arms that causes her to scream in agony. "Now, now, Miss Bane, I need you here with me." He cuts her arms and legs free then picks her up and pulls her in front of him, presses his gun up into her neck underneath her chin.

  "Come any closer and I'll paint this room with her fucking cranium, do you goddamn understand me?" His voice ricochets off of the far wall and only the echo answers him. "Now, I'm going to start making my way toward the door. And I'm going to take Miss Bane with me and get in her boyfriend's car. We're going to go for a little drive. If I so much as see headlights in the rearview mirror, I'll send her head rolling out the window. Do we have an understanding?"

  Chapter 15

  Everything around Angela is spinning now. She's afraid to know how much blood she's lost and the way the edge of every corner, every line is blurring, she's pretty sure she lost too much. Somewhere far away, Barton is screaming at whoever waits, lurking in the dark corner of the building. Other voices yell back and the sheer speed at which it all circles around Angela is frightening.

  Men walk forward, coming into view now. Th
ey're not police officers and Angela doesn't recognize them but somehow Barton seems to understand now, even though he doesn't let Angela in on the joke. The men lay down their weapons and Barton's grinning from ear to ear. Just then there's a crack like thunder and Barton falls to the floor in a circling dive and there's now no one to hold Angela up on her feet anymore. Her body turns as well and there's Maddox half standing, half leaning on some invisible crutch, gun pointed at where Barton had been standing. But he only stands there a moment because the next second his body lurches with each of three loud explosions from the barrel of Barton's gun as he rolls around on the ground. Angela screams as Maddox's body, broken and bleeding, falls into a heap once more.

  Barton tries to rise up on his feet, but he's slipping on the blood pouring out of his body and all over the concrete and then Maddox is leaning forward, gun raised and then one single bullet flies out from the chamber in a burst of orange fire hitting Barton right in the eye. His face slaps against the blood-covered floor and Barton isn't slipping anymore.

  Angela falls to the floor herself and crawls her way over to Maddox and cradles his head in her arms. He smiles up at her, eyes glassy and fading. She cries to him, "Please, Maddox, please!" Her own blood is still spilling out all over his body and she sobs with the horror of it all as black liquid starts to come bubbling up from the back of Maddox's throat and he begins to choke. Voices are chiming in all around them, men and women rushing in to secure the scene, to take the two of them to safety, to make everything better. And then the dizziness takes on a whole new level and darkness swirls around her vision until it's all she can see and consciousness takes its leave.

  ***

  A world of light erupts in one full color burst and Angela opens her eyes. She can feel the tubes connected to her body and hear the monotonous beep of a heart monitor. And just as quickly as she realizes she's okay and in the hospital, she remembers that Maddox is dead. Tears quickly stream from her eyelids and she fights to keep from hyperventilating.

  Now more than ever, she wishes it would all go away. Wishes she had died for once and for all back in that parking garage twenty-two years ago. But here she is still breathing, heart still beating. She thinks about how much the world has changed, how the one man she thought was truly fighting on her side who could make some of those changes was now dead, had tried to kill her twice. And there was still the question of who had come to her rescue in that building and who had paid Immortal Coil Labs to keep her body for decades longer than they had to and who made sure she was the first to be brought back from such a horrendous death.

  It wasn't like it mattered who. She wasn't thankful at all for what she had been given. She wanted to give it all back. Would have given it all back if she'd ever had a choice. She thought about her time with Maddox and then felt guilty for wanting to give up that time. But what did even that matter now. If she hadn't come back from the depths of hell, Maddox would still be alive. The nurse comes in for a moment and looks Angela over. "You look awful miserable, Miss Bane. You really need some more rest, so I'm just gonna..." She pushes a button on the machine standing next to Angela. All of a sudden the room is taking on a softness all around her. Everything becomes fuzzy in a warm and comfortable kind of way until it all fades out of existence and into some cozy darkness where pain doesn't exist.

  ***

  Angela wakes up to find a familiar but confusing face watching her. Noah Masterson stands, leaning against the wall next to her bed, with a pleasant smile on his face. "Hi, Angela. I do hope you don't mind if I call you Angela?" She doesn't answer, just stares dumbly. "I'll take that as a no. You see, Angela, I've been wanting so badly to meet you for so very long. I very much admire the work you've done toward saving the environment back in your day. Contrary to what some might believe, I don't want to give up hope on Mother Earth just yet, however, I'm also a realist who thinks a smart race prepares itself for any and all potential outcomes. No matter how dire those outcomes might be. And I'm sure you of all people know just how dire things could be if we can't manage to reverse the drastic changes in our climate—anyway, I didn't come here to lecture you on what you already know more than most.

  "I came here to express my deep gratitude for your work, for doing what I long hoped you would do, if given the chance, taking down that bastard and putting a stop to the horrible things he was doing—"

  "I don't understand."

  Masterson stood up straight and walked over to Angela's bedside. "I had my suspicions about Barton way back before he came after you. I knew he was somehow connected to the bombings but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't find any proof. And, I'll be honest, Miss Bane, I've been far more wrapped up in this Mars immigration project to do anything of substance toward some kind of investigation. And when I heard you were murdered, I guessed who and why and I paid ICL to extend your stasis time indefinitely and to bump you up on any potential new Resus procedures geared toward those with horrendous injuries. They were more than happy to keep you on ice beyond the original contract and to provide you first place in any cutting edge new Resus procedures that might be able to bring you back. And so... Here we are."

  Angela forced a smile but it didn't last. "You'll have to forgive me if I don't feel quite so happy about this arrangement. And just what in the hell did you get out of it, anyway?"

  "Well, Barton out of the way, for one. Also, as I said, I admire your work and I think together we could make a hell of a team from the best of both worlds—no pun intended."

  "I'm not so sure I think that will work."

  "Why?"

  "Well, we obviously have two very different outlooks on things for one. For another, I don't trust you. I saw some of your handiwork when the eco wars started. Saw how quickly you managed to buy off your enemies or blackmail them. Which brings up a question. Why didn't you just make a move against Barton back when you first connected him with the Nashville Court Bomber?"

  "Miss Bane, there's a fine line between suspecting someone and having evidence that would hold up in court. I knew you would find the evidence if it was out there. And besides, Barton was gaining the kind of power I couldn't stand up against."

  "I guess you do have a habit of depending on outside sources with some kind of fanciful hope or faith to fix everything."

  "Now, that hurts, Miss Bane. That hurts a great deal. The world is a dirty place. And one that I sometimes have a hard time understanding. Remind me again just what it is about this Earth that you feel is worth Resuscitating?"

  "Well, you did have me Resuscitated, Mr. Masterson."

  "Touché, Miss Bane. Touché indeed. I'll be leaving now, so you can get some rest. I'm terribly sorry if my actions have been complicated for you. But I want you to know, I do strongly believe we would make a great team and I did know you would do the right thing when it came to Barton. The two of you might have been on the same side, but I saw the madness within him and now you have too. Perhaps you'll accept a token of my appreciation in the form of a very special gift?"

  Angela, head growing foggy from the drugs currently pumping through her system, merely looks up from the slur her head has managed to slide down into.

  "Good evening, Miss Bane. And again... Whether you want me to or not, I thank you."

  And with that, Masterson leaves the room. Deep inside, something old sparks to life within Angela. She knows now without a doubt that she's still the same person she was before her murder. She knows this because of the burning desire within her to get back to work doing what he's always been so great at. After all, the world won't save itself and it's not like there's any other place she would rather go.

  Chapter 16

  Jonathan Maddox wakes up to the sound of machines bringing him back to life. It doesn't take him long to realize that he's been Resuscitated to his most recent backup. Just moments before he had been doing his daily routine, helping to keep order in an otherwise disordered universe. But now, he can feel the weight of something missing from that life. So
mething marvelous. When he's had his rest in recovery and he can finally have visitors, the most peculiar and unexpected person walks into his room and amazement strikes his heart at once.

  He remembers her face from the reports. Angela Bane, that star environmental prosecutor who had taken down more crooked corporations than any other before her or since. And now she's sitting beside his bed and staring at him with an odd expression on her face.

  "They tell me you won't remember me... At least not alive me. We met just a few short weeks ago and your last backup procedure was back in January."

  Maddox just stares in her eyes, anticipating the mystery this woman is presenting to him now.

  "I know you don't remember, but I can't thank you enough for helping me catch my killer and saving my life. Even if I'm still not quite so sure it should have been saved."

  Maddox wants to speak up, wants to tell her it's okay, that she should want to live, but something holds his voice back and instead he continues to stare, dumbfounded. Angela reaches out and takes his hand in hers. "I know it'll take some time to catch you up with what you've missed, but I want you to know I'll be right here by your side."

  Maddox's face reddens with the awkwardness of the situation. Looking in Angela's eyes, he knows there was something between them and he can sense the ease in which he could certainly fall in love with such a woman. He takes a long deep breath and smiles. "Thank you for coming."