Chapter 21:
John started having more frequent nightmares. His escape was urgent. He didn’t know some-thing was planned, but was filled with the sense of the urgency. He couldn’t get away at night, and he hadn’t previously thought of evening, as there were always so many around. But he was beginning to be desperate. Night fell early in Winter, and it was full dark by dinner time.
Bob and Rudy watched from close to the door of the staff dining room, Timothy next to the internal door that led to the large kitchen and officers’ dining room. John was at a table, looking relaxed, even carefree, listening to Kyle and Jimmy try to explain the rules of baseball. It seemed he wasn’t familiar with the game. His guards were warned. The subject was woundup, tense. It was thought that he might be about to try something. They knew the watchers had information they didn’t. They were very alert.
John had just made a laughing comment to Kyle, when the lights went out. The guards grabbed the torches they were now issued with, and played them over the room. John was discovered suddenly in bright light again, with his hand on the far wall. There was no door there. “Grab him!” bellowed Bob. A nearby soldier, rather hesitantly, took John by the arm as his guards strode over to him.
John leaned against the wall, looking as if amused. “Don’t get your weasand in a wonk! There’s not even a door here.”
“Don’t get your weasand in a wonk?” said Kyle.
John shrugged, still hiding his acute disappointment. He’d been about to make a hole in the wall, step through, fix it, and be gone before they could work out what was happening. But he still tried not to make his magic obvious, and this time, he only said, “Just an expression. It means don’t get upset.” He looked kindly at his guards, and spoke to Kyle. “They get nervous, poor chaps, just because there’s a blackout now and then.”
At that moment, the lights came back on. Bob and Rudy both had John now, holding him very firmly, one at each arm. Timothy actually had his baton in hand. John glanced at the baton, and asked if it was all right to finish his dinner. Rudy said bitterly, “I should bloody handcuff you to the chair!”
A jolt of alarm surged through John, but he tried to show no indication, only said with some apparent indignation, “I’ve been perfectly well behaved. I was eating dinner and there was a blackout.”
Rudy looked skeptical, and he’d felt the flinch as he mentioned handcuffs, too.
Delivered afterward to his bedroom, Peter and Nicholas were warned that he’d tried something, though they didn’t know what. John said nonsense, and asked if Peter and Nicholas would like him to make them coffee. They glanced at each other, and accepted. Like John, they’d come to the conclusion that life was easier if they pretended to be friends whenever not actually in conflict. But when John was supposedly watching a film, he was racking his brains again. He had magic, didn’t he? Surely he must be able to get away, and without hurting anyone.
Nicholas felt John’s eyes on him, and drew his stun gun. They were always ready. John looked away.
The anti Germ Warfare demonstrators lost their enthusiasm with the cold weather, and the sight of an apparent prisoner riding a horse didn’t fit their theories. With the disappearance of the demonstrators, the limitations on John’s riding were eased. There was no way he could escape in full daylight, with riflemen watching him. He loved Naji, and seldom exhausted her, so that nearly every day, it was Naji that was led into the Compound for him. They let him visit the stables afterward now, when he wanted to, and he could talk to all eight of the horses, including Bess, whom he was so fond of.
There were only a few days left of November when General Buller came to visit. For the first time, he asked Mark if he could meet the subject, rather than just see the film.
“Of course,” said Mark, “But don’t expect any great subservience from him - he’ll probably, perfectly casually, call you Stan.”
Buller smiled. “He sounds a character.”
“Sometimes, it’s like he sparkles with life, and yet, other times, he looks as cold as ice, as if he has no emotion whatever.”
He then impressed the general by quickly checking the RAB, bringing up four screens, and pointing to one that showed John and three soldiers, including a woman, eating ice-creams in the very weak sunshine.
“Ice-creams!” said Buller. “In the middle of Winter!”
“I asked him about that. He said that this cold is nothing compared to that of Riosta, where he comes from.”
“Riosta?”
“It means nothing. He just likes to keep us hopping. The backroom boys are still trying to work out where the expression, ‘to get your weasand in a wonk’ might originate. But they think he made it up.”
The soldiers saluted and edged off respectfully as the senior officers approached, but not before John whispered in the ear of Emilie, who shook her head laughingly. She’d have liked to, but where?
As expected, John greeted General Stanley Buller as Stan, and asked why he hadn’t met him before. Buller made an evasive reply, before starting an easy conversation about Christmas rituals.
John asked, “Did you hear about the glowchooks?”
Buller smiled, “They told me about the glowchooks, but I wanted to know what you’d really do for Christmas if you were free.”
John looked at him. The man was quite small, and his hair was grey. He wondered if this man could free him if he chose. And when he looked musingly into the distance, for a change, he didn’t pretend. “There would be lots of lights. Lots and lots of all colored lights so that other people would sneer at the vulgarity of the display. But they’d sparkle over the snow, and look like nothing but Christmas.”
Mark had never seen this face of John. He’d spoken in a yearning tone, not hiding his longing. “Who would be there, John?” he asked softly.
John laughed, “I’ll have seven sisters and three brothers. They all have children, and there would be fights all day, because Timothy told me, cousins always fight.”
Buller asked, “Do you have a wife, John?”
John stared at the vision in his mind. He would have a wife. It must be so wonderful to sleep with a woman all night, to be able to reach out a hand, and touch whenever he wanted. He shook his head, and spoke now in a flat voice. “I don’t know.”
The two senior officers glanced at each other. It didn’t look as if they’d get anything more out of John, and there was no information in what he’d said. Just the desire for a normal life, and the longing not to be so alone.
General Buller changed the subject, and he and Mark talked about horse breeding, until John started to speak more naturally again.
Buller finally said, “Can I see this wonderful horse of yours?”
John looked at Mark. “The stables are outside the Compound. It’s up to the boss.” Mark nodded.
John was accustomed to the guards that surrounded him, but Buller was surprised when three personal guards stayed close, and four more soldiers surrounded them at a greater distance, all very aware of the subject. The stables along with a small field nearby were fully enclosed with a fence that didn’t look easy to climb, and the gate was firmly closed after they passed through. But John seemed relaxed, and Buller reminded himself that this sort of environment was all he knew.
John caressed Bess, “She’s the best little mare, Stan. It’s not really in her nature, but she learned to buck and play with me when I wanted it. And she’s quiet and easy if I’m not well.”
Buller was surprised. “And this is the famous horse?” They were in the field, where the horses spent most days, though stabled at night. John whistled, and the glossy, black mare pranced over to him.
“This is Naji,” he said. “She’s the best too, in a different way.”
He knew all the horses, and they all knew him, even those that Adam and Ernest habitually rode. There was some competition. They all wanted to be close to him, but little Bess was closest.
As they started wa
lking back to the Compound, General Buller looked at the more distant soldiers. He’d ask Mark about those later. John didn’t even seem aware of them, and he knew that his eyesight was erratic. He’d known each horse though, even the ones who looked quite similar to each other.
John said a friendly hello to the gate guards as he was let back into the Compound. He still acted as if it was routine, not as if he was a prisoner desperately looking for escape. General Buller said casually, “It’s unlikely that Jarred Forster will be back, by the way, John. He’s on long term sick leave. Boils. Every time he seems a little better, they just come back. I saw him yesterday. He could barely walk. A very inconvenient spot, apparently.”
John said, surprised, “I thought no-one had boils any more. Isn’t it a very old fashioned thing? A bad diet or something?”
Buller threw him a very shrewd look. “It is rare. And the doctors don’t seem able to help. That’s why I wondered if you had something to do with it.”
“Me?” said John, in blank astonishment. “I haven’t even seen him since...” He reddened. He still hated to think how he’d so completely lost control, and nearly hurt Zack.
Mark said casually, “When Jarred was here in September, John was ill. I don’t think he even saw him.”
John confirmed, “I don’t remember seeing him then.”
John stood still, watching after Stan as he left with Mark. He’d quite deliberately exposed himself a little, but he didn’t think it had made the slightest difference. He went to the gymnasium, and hammered into the punching bag for a while.
In Mark’s office, the general was saying that John did cause a conflict of loyalties sometimes.
Mark nodded. “The female agent who used to report on him finally committed suicide. She said that it was too hard any longer.”
“I saw the report. Is she to be replaced?”
“I’ve asked for a replacement. She gave us more of an insight into John’s true feelings than we had from any other source. Today was unusual. I think it’s almost the first time he’s shown himself so much.”
Buller frowned over his coffee. Finally, he put it down on the desk. “Mark, do you think we’re really justified, keeping this young man prisoner?”
Mark nodded with certainty, “We’re justified. I didn’t know about Forster before, but now I’ll show you something.”
It took a while to find the particular piece of film. It showed John unconscious. Forster had looked at him, and spoken about the rape. Quite clearly, John was seen to open his eyes, smile, and then close them again. Mark said, “He was unconscious, ill, and probably doesn’t remember. But see this graph tracing along at the bottom of the picture. It shows a pattern that we’re convinced indicates those times when he’s using, or trying to use his power. Just before he smiles. I think it very likely that John is responsible for Forster’s boils.”
Buller said after a pause, “Jarred has his faults, but he’s in almost constant pain now. I don’t think he deserved that.”
Mark said nothing, but he thought that Forster had asked for it.
Buller spoke again. “It would have appeared to have been an unequal battle, but it appears that your John Doe won.”
Mark sighed. “It’s not Forster who’s scheduled for a brain operation next Tuesday.”
“Next Tuesday?”
Mark nodded. “They’re just trying to establish the likely range, but after Tuesday, brainwaves will be monitored, and at the press of a button, we can disable him by rendering him unconscious, and if he becomes uncontrollable, he can be killed. And at a distance of eighty kilometers, maybe more.”
Stan Buller said heavily, “Option C. I know.”
“We’ve labeled the device, CUZ, for convenience. Like RAB, it doesn’t actually stand for anything, although it misleads anyone prying. But I’m quite convinced that Option C is essential. He’s becoming harder and harder to control. Even surrounded by guards, encircled by high fences, often ill, and yet he’s come close to escape more than once. And I don’t think he yet knows his own full power. It’s either this, or simply ensuring that next time he goes down to the head pain, he doesn’t wake up.”
Buller spoke irritably. “I know, I know. I wouldn’t have approved it if I didn’t agree the necessity. It’s just that seeing him today.......”
Mark smiled sadly. “I like him too.”
Buller walked to the window, looking over the well tended grounds, the high fences as a backdrop. “The same surgeon?”
“Bartlett will assist, but he says it’s very precise brain surgery. We’ve found someone, though.” His face was grim. “He’s been deregistered for unethical research, but he’s an expert.”
That night, John screamed and fought his bedclothes in his panic to escape his nightmare. Nicholas took the lead, acting to soothe him as he shook violently afterward, tears still on his face. Peter set a mug of hot chocolate on the table for him, and after a while, he used both hands to take the soothing drink. They wouldn’t let him outside to walk it off, of course, as he wanted, but the unexpected kindness stopped him trying, the next night, to make them both faint at once.
Instead, Sunday afternoon, in low light and drizzling rain, he walked behind a shelf of books in the library, and was not seen again until he was stopped with a warning burst of rifle fire from one of the guards on the fence. He was becoming more desperate, and Isaac and Mark knew that he was having repeated nightmares. They stayed away from him. If they came close, they thought, he’d know.
Monday, he raced as hard as he could, riding Naji, the long reins held very securely by Adam and Ernest, on their horses. The sharpshooters in their jeeps were very alert. All the soldiers knew of the increasingly reckless escape attempts. It was harder to be relaxed with him now, when their orders made it clear that he was liable to try and escape from anywhere, any time.
Monday afternoon, Emilie took him to bed with her in her own room in the soldiers’ barracks. The encouragement had come from her own supervisors, on instructions from above. Afterwards, he held her very tight, and quite suddenly, he was sobbing in her arms as she held him close and tried to calm him.
He was very apologetic afterwards, and when she asked why he couldn’t just be content with what he had, he caressed her face, and only said that he was a fool. To tell her that he was terrified that they were about to do something to him would only lay an unnecessary burden on her. She thought she was a tough soldier, in spite of her gender. John could never think of a woman as any sort of a soldier.
They were watched, though Emilie didn’t know that. They hoped he might fall into a deep sleep, and then he could be drugged as he slept, in Emilie’s room. They still preferred him not to start fighting. But he only made love with her a second time, kissed her very tenderly afterward, and went to his cold, bare tree for a while, ignoring the rain. Emilie stared a while from a distance, at the lonely figure surrounded by his guards. There seemed to be more guards all the time.
The operating theatre was prepared for brain surgery. Ward 3 was prepared for the recovering patient. They expected he’d miss Christmas, as the head wound had to be completely healed before he was allowed to wake. He was not to know what they’d done to him. His hair would not be shaved, for the same reason.
Worried by his guessed at powers, they aimed to take him down in the early hours of the morning, when he was most likely to be asleep, although that was by no means certain these days. The surgeons would be ready for him at four in the morning. Nicholas and Peter would not be warned, in case he was alerted by a difference in their behavior, or simply by somehow knowing what they knew. He was a Sensitive.
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