Jack in the Box (26 page)

I grinned. "You're right. So where's your dinner?"

He turned to the table. Nothing there. He rotated his chair back so that he faced me. His eyebrows were raised.

"Forgetting the rules? No testin
g
durin
g
meals."

He swallowed.

"Dinner's in ten minutes, Brian."

"But-"

"You come early. That's your fault."

He shifted in his seat.

"See, I knew I couldn't catch you," I walked to the side, "And hey, I'll admit, most of the time you can out-fight me. . ."

He smiled. Pulled at the cuff.

"So since I couldn't run to win, or fight to win, I thought I'd let you come to me." I stopped and turned to face Brian.

He held his breath.

I smiled. "So, say it."

He narrowed his eyes. Smirked. "So, this was plan B?"

I opened my mouth. Paused. "More like. . .part two of plan A, but. . .sure."

He nodded bluntly and pulled at the cuffs again.

"Looks like you need one of these," I held up the key to the handcuffs.

He nodded, "Well, that's real cute of you."

"Why go on, Brian?" I put the key in my pocket. "You know you can't win."

"You know why," he breathed. He stood up, bringing the chair up with him.

I stepped back. Held the gun firmly.

"Please, Jack. Just stay here. Just live in here."

As I stared at Brian, I noticed something. His eyes. They always shone to me. They always stuck out. But I realized something else. It was why they always struck me.

Brian and I had the same eye-color.

He took a step forward. "You haven't caught me. Now, please, just stop."

I lifted the pistol. "
I
wil
l
use this."

"Your threat is inconsistent with your acts." He pulled his arm out to the side. The chair dangled from his wrist. His veins swelled.

"No, you see, I've thought of this part, too." I tightened my fingers on the handle.

"You did?"

I nodded.

He exhaled. "So you've decided to kill."

I shook my head.

He took a step forward. "So, what?"

I bit my lip.

Another step toward me.

I tilted my head. "This place isn't hell, but. . . we still can't bleed out, can we?"

He opened his mouth. "Well-" he stopped. "Wait. What?"

I quickly aimed the gun down and shot his foot.

His pupils dilated. All his muscles tensed. Immediate screaming. He fell to the floor. The chair fell on top of him.

"I'm sorry," I winced. Aimed at the other foot.

He pushed the chair off and sweep-kicked my leg with his unharmed foot.

My knees gave and I fell to the floor.

Heaving loud breaths, he crawled onto me, dragging himself by his hands.

I squirmed.

He reached into my pocket.

"No!" I pushed him off and kicked his chest.

He yelled and fell onto his butt. His foot had smeared blood across the floor.

I clambered to my feet and aimed the gun at him.

Brian gritted his teeth.

"Come on, Brian," I pleaded.

He leaned on the chair. Grinding his teeth, he lifted himself on his good foot. He grunted as he did so.

My eyes widened.

He breathed out loudly. Grabbed the chair.

"Brian. . ."

He lifted it. Swung it into the wall as hard as he could.

The arm broke out of the framework. Then it slid out of the cuffs.

The hand cuffs dangled from his wrist.

"Brian."

He fell onto his knees. His eyes watery. He moaned with each breath. But he got back up. With his free hand, he grabbed the ledge of the table and pulled himself up. Adrenaline seemed to overpower the pain. He stood on both feet and yelled. His teeth snapped together.

I lifted the gun. Kept it aimed low. "Just give up!"

He ran for me, still yelling. "I can't!"

"Brian, why?"

"Because I'm saving your life!"

I closed my eyes. My finger tightened on the trigger.

He knocked my hand to the side. The gun fired; the bullet went into the wall.

He squeezed my wrist and yanked the pistol from my hand.

I reached for the gun, but he twisted my wrist and knocked me with the hand cuffs.

I staggered back. In front of me was a man with one foot shot, one wrist cuffed, and one hand holding a gun aimed at my face. I put my hands up slowly "How are you. . ."

"Jack, I wanted you to stop. I hoped you would just give up. But I can't trust that you'll leave me alone with my foot like this."

Sweat dripped from both of our faces. True agony was on his.

"You can't kill me, Brian. The rules. . ." I kept my hands up.

"Not killing you. Quite the opposite. But if my foot's out, the only way I can keep you from passing. . ." He aimed the gun down, "is if yours is, too."

My hands slowly came back down to my sides.

His hand shook. "Five bullets. First bullet, you shot a door. Second bullet, you shot a bulb. Third one, my foot. Fourth, the wall. And this one. . ." He cocked the pistol.

I stared at him.

He stared at my foot.

I exhaled. "Go on, I won't stop you."

His eyes quickly looked into mine. Then they went back to my foot.

"Kinda' weird, right?" I said. "All this time, you wondered if I had the guts to shoot. So, what about you?"

He bit his lip. "I can't let you pass, Jack." He closed his eyes.  "He'll kill you if I let you pass." He pulled the trigger. The barrel rocked forward.

Click.

He opened his eyes. No round had fired. The gun hadn't shot.

His legs collapsed. "No. . ."

I took a step toward him.

His eyes widened and he fidgeted with the gun. Cocked it again.

Another step toward Brian.

He pulled the trigger again. No gunshot.

I reached into my pocket.

His eyes followed my hand.

I pulled out a bullet. It shone under the light.

He pulled out the magazine. "But. . ."

I dropped the bullet. It bounced twice, then rolled into the corner of the room. "I knew my body wouldn't beat you, Brian."

His head hung. He had lost a lot of blood. A small pool sat beside him.

"So, I had to beat you with my mind."

nineteen

His eyes fluttered.

"It's okay Brian. You didn'
t
le
t
me win. You didn't."

His skin was pale. He looked around with his eyes. Let out a sigh.

I walked over to Brian. "I'm sorry." I squatted next to him and put my hand on his shoulder.

Sorry for passing? No. Sorry for fighting my way out? No. Sorry for hurting him. Yes. I was sorry.

He breathed in and out shakily. And that was the moment. The moment I thought would never happen. The thing I thought he'd never do

Brian gave up.

"Don't be sorry." He smiled sadly. His entire demeanor had changed. It was almost odd. But he'd realized it was over now. There was nothing he could do. He was helpless. But that didn't frustrate him. No. In fact, I think it relieved him.

I exhaled. "Hang in there, gravity won't take its toll yet."

He let out a small laugh. But his face fell. "I've done you so much wrong."

I shook my head. "It wasn't you. It was the authority over you."

His lips quivered. "I. . . I'm sorry, Jack. All the things I said. All the times I hurt you-"

"You were trying to save my life. I didn't understand those things then, but I do understand this: now we can both live."

Brian bit his lip. "I don't know if I'll ever meet another person like you, Jack." He squinted. His eyes started to water. He put his head back.

I got down on my knees and put my hand under his head. "What are you saying? No one's leaving. We're getting out of this together."

He shook his head. "That's not how it's going to work." His breaths were getting shorter.

I looked down at his foot. He was still losing blood.

"Don't worry," he groaned. "I'm not going to die. They will heal it."

"Then what?"

He reached up and grabbed my wrist. He lifted the watch in front of my face. "I'll never forget you, Jack."

The watch reflected light onto him.

I held his arm. Felt myself breathing heavily. What was happening? I would never see him again? "No, see, we're getting out of here together. No more testing. We can be free together."

He slowly took his arm back. "I won't forget." He nodded at the watch.

I shook my head. "I. . . I won't forget you." Things grew blurry. I wiped my eyes. Tried to hold back tears. For everything Brian had done, he had only been trying to save me.

His eyes rolled up.

"Hey. . ."

He became limp. He had passed out.

I gently let his head down on the floor.

The lights flickered. A deep bass sound resounded from outside the room.

"Well," the referee became visible, "I'll admit, you surprised me."

I looked up at him. "What's going to happen?"

He sniffed. "Sweet dreams."

→

The dream was vivid. Still unreal, still not one-to-one with reality, but it was the clearest I'd had thus far. I was at the head of a long table. Several individuals sat on both sides of this table, with folders and laptops and pens sitting in front of them. They all paid close attention to me.

"I wanted to tell you all at once," I tapped the folder in front of me with a pen, "since you are all my top investors. I need your support in this. To implement these other two projects, OTB can no longer just rely on the government's financing. To make it work, I need all of you in."

"Why?" an older lady, sitting a few seats down, leaned in.

"Because we need the money."

"No, I mean. . ." she took off her glasses, "Why implement these projects now? Project Box is tomorrow. I thought that was the end of it."

"And," a man sitting across from her cut in, "you haven't exactly explained what these other projects are." He opened his folder. "Maybe we should start there."

I stood. "Don't worry, I was just getting to that."

They all focused their attention on me.

"With Project B, we are essentially creating a perfect race," I looked across the room at the wall. "Based on physical characteristics, as well as philosophical ones."

A pin-drop silence filled the room.

"But what happens after that?" I scanned their eyes. "Will we have children? Will we risk an imperfection to weed its way back into the human population?"

They gave me puzzled expressions.

"Project C," I reached into my pocket.

A few chuckles.

I pulled out an ear swab which rested inside a capped tube. "This is all we need," I displayed it in front of me, "for Project Copy."

"What - exactly - are you talking about?" that same lady inquired.

"The C would have been for 'clone,' but it's not quite the same thing you see in science-fiction movies. There's no machine that I can just walk into and come out with a replica of myself." I uncapped the tube.

They watched me closely.

"The 'copy' - as we are calling it - is taken from cells. Just a few are all we need. We place the cells in an upright chamber, and after ten days, a copy is birthed. Fully grown, with the same characteristics of the original."

Someone laughed. "I thought you said thi
s
wasn'
t
science-fiction."

I ran the swab across inside of my cheek. "No surrogate needs to birth the copy." I placed the swab back in the tube. "Instead, there is this," I took a picture from my folder. It displayed a metal container, looking to be a few feet higher than a person. On the front side was a door. Honestly, it looked like a metal out-house.
"
Thi
s
will be the copy's mother." I displayed the picture to those present. "The copy will grow at a rapid pace inside this chamber, and then he will come out an adult. This covers the problem of physical imperfections that children could inherit."

They stared in disbelief.