If you walk in the darkness, keeping pretty quiet, you're as good as invisible to 'em — so keep walking, pal.'

  They both walked to the White House.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Gumshoe saw his mother and father. They looked the same age as they had been when he last saw them, as if eternally young. But they were staring at each other with eyes widened by insanity because their heads had been severed from their bodies and surgically grafted onto the neck-stump of a pig's body to make a nightmarish two-headed creature. Gumshoe's parents were still conscious, fully alive in that sense, but their awareness of what had happened to them had clearly driven them mad.

  Gumshoe screamed when he saw them. His scream reverberated through the night. His pain shook him out of his reverie of dread and cast him into another place. It was not much better here, just more surgical mutations, bed after bed of unfortunate human beings who'd had lips and noses surgically removed, leaving great, bloody holes into which tubes had been driven, letting them breathe artificially until they were given the steel-plated masks that would aid their breathing for the rest of their lives when they were turned into cyborgs. Also there were human beings without legs and arms, but still alive with functioning heads and torsos, strapped to surgical beds, eyes wide — like the eyes of Gumshoe's parents — with the horror of what they had become and what could still be done to them.

  There were human beings with animal bodies and animals with human limbs and severed human heads wired to machines and functioning perfectly, albeit half crazed. There were many such monstrosities.

  Gumshoe screamed again, closing his eyes, trying to escape, and went spinning down through a whirlpool of darkness and far-off, streaming stars. Gradually everything slowed down, as in a slow-motion movie, and he found himself drifting through a darkness filled with flickering, silvery-white

  fireflies that reminded him of the electrochemical signals, the neurons, that pass information from one point in the brain to another. He was lost in the cosmos, the great teeming brain of the universe, and he heard a bass humming sound, almost felt it, an infrasound. As the sound grew louder, as the pressure increased, the silvery-white fireflies multiplied dramatically, flickering on and off more rapidly, then started streaking this way and that at incredible speeds, now here and then there, living and dying on the instant, creating countless lines of light that criss-crossed repeatedly until they formed an immense, glowing, constantly changing web, the strands of which converged on a distant, rhythmically pulsating, mesmerizing dark core.

  Now terrified, convinced that he was approaching a monstrous, steadily breathing, all-devouring spider in the centre of its immense web — a virtual cosmos of darkness and streaming light and infrasounds that could be felt — Gumshoe kept gliding magically forward, surrounded by the darting fireflies, the crisscrossing silvery-white lines, an abyss of nothingness on all sides, up and down, beyond time and space. Approaching that pulsating dark core at the heart of the great web, he felt the bass humming sound, the infrasound, as if it was a palpable presence, moving in on him, pressing upon him on all sides, about to crush the life out of him. He screamed again and . . .

  He awakened from his long sleep. Bright light stung his eyes. After blinking repeatedly to adjust to the light, he licked his dry lips, moved his body to ascertain that it was still there, that he had only been dreaming about the surgical mutations, then nervously, reluctantly, looked about him.

  He was alone. Lying on a bed with white sheets and plump

  pillows in a small, rectangular room with white-painted walls. All white. Everything. There were no windows in the room and the door, which was as white as everything else, blended into the walls. There was a bedside cabinet. A glass of what looked like water was resting upon it. Against the wall at the other end of the bed was a white-painted wardrobe, the doors of which were closed. There was nothing else in the room. The floors were made of what looked like white linoleum and had no mats or carpets.

  The room had the appearance and feel of a private room in a hospital, though without the small luxuries that a private patient might reasonably expect. Looking down at himself, he saw that his clothes had been stripped from him and that he had been dressed in a pair of sky-blue pyjamas. He felt bright and yet sluggish, as if he had slept for a long time, and only gradually recalled, with reluctance, with rising fear, just where he was and how he had come to be here.

  'Oh, my God, it's real!' he said.

  Shocked by the sound of his own voice, which seemed unnaturally loud even though he had only whispered, he glanced at the door, fully expecting someone, attracted by his instinctive outburst, to come in and attend to him, for good or for bad. Recalling the man in black, the one who had shown him and the other abductees through the bowels of the mother ship, he wasn't sure that he wanted any kind of visitor, though he knew that sooner or later he would surely get one. Thus again reminded of just where he was, in a cyborg mother ship at the bottom of the sea, he felt less fear than he had felt before, though he also felt slightly unreal. He knew that he would have to accept this, but it wouldn't be easy.

  He glanced around the room, taking note of its relative lack of contents, its immaculate, spartan cleanliness, and wondered if he should get out of bed or stay where he was. He was frightened of staying here, but also frightened of leaving, not knowing what he would find out there, on the other side of the closed door. Then he looked at the wardrobe, at its white-painted, closed doors and realized that he was frightened of that as well, of what he might find inside it if he opened the doors . . .

  severed limbs, a dead body. Though accepting that this was ridiculous, a paranoid thought, he decided that he had to put his mind at rest by looking inside the wardrobe. Perhaps he would find his old clothes there and could at least put them on. He would feel more real then.

  'Right/ he said, speaking aloud. 'Let's do it.'

  He was just about to throw the top sheet off him when the room door opened.

  Shocked, frightened again, he pulled the sheet back over his body and looked up as the door opened wider and someone walked in. Relief surged through him when he saw that it was not the man in black but a middle-aged woman of nondescript demeanour, wearing a white tunic over black slacks, with flat shoes on her feet. She wasn't smiling and, when she approached the bed, he saw that her eyes were dead. Not quite dead, but certainly unemotional, with a steady, rarely blinking, gaze. She fixed that gaze upon him.

  'How do you feel?' she asked him, speaking tonelessly.

  'Okay,' he replied. 'A bit unreal.'

  'That's to be expected.' She took hold of his right wrist, felt his pulse, then placed a thermometer between his lips, waited for a moment, withdrew it and checked it. 'Excellent,' she said. 'The sleep did you some good. Your pulse and temperature are perfectly normal. You're no longer in panic'

  'How long was I sleeping?' he asked her.

  Five days,' she said.

  Gumshoe was shocked. He couldn't imagine being asleep that long without being dead. Now he felt that he had died and been resurrected, which was a frightening thought. Nevertheless, when he saw the dead eyes of the woman, he determined not to show the fear he felt. He wanted to ask her a lot of questions — a lot — but he was reluctant to do so. This was fear, also.

  Are you a nurse?' he managed to ask.

  'Sort of. So how was your sleep?'

  'It must have been deep if I slept for five days,' Gumshoe said, getting some of his old sarcasm back and determined to keep it as a form of defence. 'How did you manage to make me sleep that long? Was I drugged?'

  'We prefer to call it sedated,' the woman replied, her voice as remote and as cold as the dark side of the Moon. 'They're designed to help you recover from the shock and adjust to this place.'

  'I had lots of dreadful nightmares,' Gumshoe said.

  'What makes you think they were nightmares?' the woman said. Then, with a wintry smile, she turned away and walked out.

  Shaken by her remark, which he assumed had been made for the very purpose of unsettling him, Gumshoe tried to put it out of his mind. But he sank back on the bed, feeling helpless, filled with returning dread, staring at the closed doors of the wardrobe and wondering what was behind them.

  Recalling his nightmares and the remark of the dead-eyed woman, he let his imagination run riot, seeing dismembered limbs and severed heads with wild, staring eyes. The longer he stared at the wardrobe, the more frightened he became. The more frightened he became, the more he despised himself. Eventually, however, desperately trying to conquer his fear, he flipped the white sheet back, clambered out of bed and walked to the wardrobe. He was astonished, when he reached it, to realize just how quickly his heart was beating. Licking his lips, trying to breathe evenly, he slowly opened the doors.

  His clothes, obviously washed and ironed, were dangling from coat-hangers inside the wardrobe. There was nothing else in there.

  Realizing, by the loud sigh of relief that automatically escaped him, just how terrible had been his expectations, how deep his fear, he stood there for some time, just staring at the clothes, wondering if he should put them on or not. Finally, deciding that he felt vulnerable in the pyjamas, somehow less strong, more

  unreal, and feeling also how badly he needed to do something positive, such as leaving the room and checking what was outside, he decided to put the clothes on. He had just reached out for his underclothes when someone spoke from behind him.

  'You really should have a shower first. You've been asleep a long time.'

  Almost jumping out of his skin, Gumshoe withdrew his hand and turned around to see that the room door had been opened and a man was now standing in the doorway. He had light blond hair, unnaturally smooth white skin, lean, handsome features and icy blue eyes. Two armed cyborgs, Gumshoe noticed, were standing behind him.

  'There's no shower,' Gumshoe said, trying to keep his voice steady.

  'Yes, there is,' the man replied. He stepped into the room and went to what looked like a blank section of the wall. When he pressed his fingers against it, a door slid open to reveal a shower and toilet inside.

  The man turned back to Gumshoe.

  'Have a shower first,' he said. 'It will make you feel better. Then put your clothes on and wait by the bed until I return.'

  His voice was like a whisper. It was also oddly flat. It was the voice of a man with no feelings, but a lot of authority. That voice, though quiet and unemotional, would brook no disobedience.

  'When will you return?' Gumshoe asked him.

  In thirty minutes exactly,' the man replied. Then he turned away and walked out, closing the door firmly behind him, leaving Gumshoe standing in a dead, oddly chilling silence.

  Though badly shaken again and not understanding why, Gumshoe did as he had been told and took a shower, first hot and then cold, feeling more invigorated with each second he was under the jetting water but even then wondering if they hadn't put something in it to affect him somehow. Nevertheless, accepting that he would, at least for now, have to do as he was told, he completed the shower, dried himself, cleaned his teeth

  and then gratefully put on his regular clothes. When he was dressed and had combed his hair, he felt a little more real. Then he went and sat on the bed to await the return of the handsome man with the icy blue eyes.

  He had taken his time in the shower and only had to wait five minutes. It was the longest five minutes of his life. As he sat there, mesmerized by the closed door of the room, wondering what was out there, he was tormented by the clinging recollection of his nightmares, particularly the one about his parents, and filled up with the pain of loss that he had managed to subdue for many years. Now, torn from his own world and facing a potentially fearsome future, perhaps one even worse than anything he could imagine, he recalled his idyllic childhood in Georgetown, when he had still been with his parents, and the shocking pain he had experienced when they abruptly disappeared and never came back. That pain had now returned, borne in on his fearsome nightmare, and he knew that if he dwelt on it too much, it would do him serious damage. He was in trouble enough right now, the worst kind of trouble imaginable, and he was going to need his every resource just to retain his sanity. So he sat there, willing himself to be defiant, desperately trying to cast out all thoughts of the past and think of only the present. Then the room door opened.

  Gumshoe looked up. The blond man had come back. He stood in the doorway, studying Gumshoe thoughtfully, a slight, unfeeling smile on his thin lips. His blue eyes, though bright with intelligence, were as cold as ice. Gumshoe was chilled by the sight of him and fought hard to control himself.

  'Ah,' the man said softly, 'you're dressed. You've had that shower, I presume?'

  'Yes,' Gumshoe said.

  The man, wearing a black turtleneck sweater, black trousers and black shoes, stepped into the room and stopped a few feet away from Gumshoe to look down upon him. Intimidated by that slight smile and icy blue gaze, Gumshoe glanced behind the

  man and saw the two armed cyborgs blocking the doorway. They were cyborgs with metal prosthetics replacing their noses and lips and with metal claws instead of human hands. Those claws, however, were flexible enough to hold stun guns that were aimed at Gumshoe. Shivering, he forced himself to meet the icy blue gaze of the man in black.

  'Who are you?' the man asked, his voice still soft and unemotional, filled with authority.

  'I'm sure you know that already,' Gumshoe said. You must have been through my billfold.'

  The man smiled again, though his amusement, if such it could be called, was clearly touched with mockery. 'True. But please tell me anyway. I'd like to hear it from your own lips.'

  Gumshoe heard his own sigh like a wind through a canyon. 'Randolph Fullbright.'

  Your friends call you Randy?'

  Yeah, right.'

  'Address?'

  Gumshoe gave his Georgetown address, adding, 'It used to be my parents' house, but now I just have a room there. Some carpetbaggers captured it.'

  'Carpetbaggers?'

  Criminal elements who take over family houses and turn them into rooms for rent. I now pay rent on my own room.'

  'That must be humiliating,' the man said.

  Its fucking annoying,' Gumshoe said.

  The man smiled again, making Gumshoe turn cold. 'What happened to your parents?'

  They were abducted by cyborgs years ago and they haven't been seen since. But you probably know that.'

  Yes, I know that. Now I know that you know it.'

  When people disappear, you bastards take them. I think everyone knows that. So where are my parents?'

  I don't think I should tell you that just yet.'

  'Are they still alive?'

  'Alive and in good health. Now let's change the subject.'

  Though trying to control himself, to remain as cool as possible, Gumshoe could not control the incredible emotions welling up inside him. He was almost in tears — tears of joy — but he managed to

  hold them back.

  'Just one question before we change the subject. Can I ask just one question?'

  'What question?'

  'Did you do brain implants on my parents? Have you changed them that way?'

  'No. We don't do that to everyone. Some serve us because they don't have a choice and your parents now serve us. They did not require brain implants.'

  Gumshoe sighed again, too loudly, with helpless relief. 'Good,' he said. 'Thanks. So . . . who are you?'

  'That's two questions.'

  'Sorry.'

  The man offered that slight, chilling smile, then said, 'I'm the person you've been tenaciously investigating.'

  'Pardon?'

  'Wilson,' the man said. I'm John Wilson.'

  Gumshoe felt the shock like an ice pick through his spine, temporarily paralysing him, making his brain seize up, almost taking his breath away and making his heart race. This was followed by the return of clear thought and its natural outcome: a fear springing from the absolute conviction that this man was speaking the truth.

  'The original Wilson?'

  'Yes.'

  'How come? Did the cyborgs clone you?'

  'Exactly.'

  'Who told them to do that?'

  'I did. I left instructins before I died and the cyborgs were programmed to obey those instructions. They cloned me when the technology was perfected and so . . . Voild! Here I am.'

  'You speak French.'

  'Which you're learning.'

  'How did you know that?'

  'There's little that we don't know about you. When we pick someone up — as we picked your parents up — we automatically monitor everyone related to them and, eventually, pick them up also. It's a matter of blood lines.'

  'What does that mean?'

  'We like to keep it in the family, as it were. When we have one, we want all.'

  'And now you've got me.'

  Yes. The end of the line. All the eggs in one basket.'

  'What does that mean?'

  You'll find out in due course.'

  Gumshoe wasn't sure that he wanted to find out. Now he only wanted to find his parents: to see them alive and, at the same time, to let them know that he was still alive. Now he ached with that need.

  'How many of you did they clone?' he asked of Wilson, not knowing what else to say.

  'Only one. There are others who look like me, but I'm the only real Wilson. The others have different identities and look to me as their God.'

  'That must make you feel good,' Gumshoe said.

  'Please don't be sarcastic'

  Though spoken quietly, flatly, the remark convinced Gumshoe that this man was not one to be messed with: that he was bound to be as ruthless as the original Wilson - as unfeelingly, inhumanly cruel.

  I m sorry,' Gumshoe asked, 'but I have to ask . . . Why do you want me?'

  I told you. You're the end of the line and we like all our eggs in one basket.' 'But -why? For the purposes of communication,' Wilson said. 'In your

  case, with your parents. We find that communication between family members can be helpful in times of stress.'

 

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