CHAPTER 7: FROM TIME TO TIME, THERE IS MORE TO LIFE THAN JUST A MUSCLE WORKING DEEP INSIDE

Siri and Finn were long away from the side room off of the marble lobby about an hour after she had awoken from her dream. She never said what she dreamt of, but she was left with nothing but conviction that Finn was correct in every word that he had said about Rennan and what was happening.

“So, now what?” she asked once she had regained her composure, almost a mile and a half by foot away from the hotel. The trip with Compound X Y Z had left her with shaky legs and an upset stomach, but now, in the fresh air and the slight chilly humidity that the inlet had carried between the buildings into the city, she felt much better.

Finn looked both left and right before he led her across the street on the crosswalk with the rest of the pedestrians that were waiting for the traffic to stop long enough to cross. “Now, we need to stay one step ahead of our friend Rennan. He is a danger to both of us. We should probably leave Geneda as soon as we can, maybe head for Catalonia or somewhere nice like that.”

“We could head back for Earth. We would be safe there. I have family. They can harbor us and mask our movements long enough to keep a few steps ahead of him.”

Finn stopped and held her by the shoulders and looked deep into her eyes with a look of sternest disagreement on his face. “Do not ever again mention that you are from Earth. Not here. Not anymore. That is a bad idea and you know it, Siri.”

Siri broke eye contact with him and blushed, her mouth agape with wordlessness. “You’re right, Finn. Sorry. I don’t know…” Why had she said that? She knew full well the dangers of mentioning her heritage, especially here, in this part of the galaxy.

Finn loosened his grip on her shoulders. “I’m sorry. That was a little harsh of me. Sometimes people coming down off of the compound lose their common sense. It happens. Just be careful from now on, okay?”

Siri nodded and apologized again. “I’m sorry.”

They took off quickly along the street, busy with lunchtime pedestrians in business clothing. A group of thyers watched them pass with suspicion, but Finn seemed to pay no mind to them so neither did Siri, even though she knew he had noticed them. The world was in a state of stasis; it was that period of time right after summer had left and right before winter set in upon them and would keep everyone inside and make them resort to using the set of tunnels and indoor bridges to navigate the urban landscape. Winter on Geneda came on fast, and cold, and then would promptly leave as suddenly as it would come.

Finn turned suddenly and took them into a station. Its doorway was a soaring gothic arch, with a metal door beneath it from which many people poured in and out of the station’s platforms, trying to get to and from their desired places to spend their lunch break. Siri was not sure of the name of this station; she had not spent too much time on this side of the city before. In fact, this so far was the longest period of time she had spent on this side of the inlet. Rennan’s apartment was on the other side, the lower side, the more gritty side. Here there lived the richer businesspeople, the ones who wore all Earth-made clothing even to take out the trash or go to the grocery store, just to say that they could. Those kind of people disgusted Siri now, but she could not help but admit that she used to be one of them.

Finn purchased a quick pass for both of them with a swipe of a magnet card and pulled her through the turnstile. He seemed to know exactly  where they were going, and apparently they had a schedule to keep because he kept checking the time on the holographic billboards that lined the terminal above them.

“Where are we going?” she called at him, but he either ignored her or did not hear her over the din of the station. After a few minutes of pulling her down the busy platform, he hung a hard left and boarded a train that was relatively empty. He sat down quickly on the bench and pulled her down with him.

“Where are we going?” she asked again.

“I heard you the first time, and decided not to tell you. If I don’t tell you, then you don’t know, and then you can be less dangerous,” he explained, looking her deeply in the eyes.

“What’s dangerous about me knowing? I won’t tell anybody, you know that.”

“Do I? I don’t know you well enough to assume that of you. I also don’t know if he will be watching us through you or not.”

“Through me?”

“With the drug. Compound X Y Z.”

Siri’s breath caught in her throat. Her own dream had taken her through the eyes of somebody she had never met, during a time that was very obviously in the past—they were talking about the Tuvian Revolution as though it had just happened, which only made sense if it had just happened. But she had never considered that other people could dream through her. She suddenly felt very naked and exposed. She pulled her jacket tighter around her body. Rennan would of course dream of her, if he had control over such a thing. There would be no reason to dream of Finn. Even so, Finn probably had safeguards in place to prevent anybody from dreaming through him. He was too smart for that, Siri could tell.

Defeated, and seeing the logic in his argument, she nodded and tried to relax into her seat as best she could.

“Just trust me,” he said. “I won’t hurt you. I promise.”

His smile was very sincere.

Chapter 6: Is This What's Left of Me?

Rennan sat upright in the white healed bed and took a deep gasp of air in. He had exited from the dream too early, he knew. The dream must have followed Siri, that would be the only explanation for his abrupt awakening at that exact moment. If the dream had followed Finn, then he would still be asleep and watching Siri dream in the past. He would not be allowed to dream in more than one layer. The human mind was not built to take that kind of subconscious  abuse. He yanked the needle out of his arm and put a hand to his forehead, wet with cold sweat once more.

He shouted in frustration. Siri was with Daniel Finn—or, was, in the very near past. She met Finn the day she had left him. That was not long ago. Then what? Would she actually believe the things he was saying to her? Of course, once she tried the compound for herself, there would be no going back. She was always one to keep her promises, a rare virtue in these parts. Siri was all kinds of rare. She was beautiful, more than beautiful. She was kind, and generous, and always willing to help others out even if it meant she would lose something when all of everything was said and done.

She had left him for a reason. Her note had been cryptic. One line, fifteen words:

I’M SORRY. I AM LEAVING. DO NOT LOOK FOR ME. THIS IS FOR YOUR SAFETY.

But did she not understand that the world without him there was more dangerous for her? How could her departure be for “his safety?” He had not understood. That is why he needed to find her. He needed to understand what she was hiding.

He swung his legs off of the bed, touched his bare feet to the floor that was neither cold nor warm, and walked over to the window. The sun was coming up again, Athena trailing closely behind it. The towers across the sparkling inlet were still lit up from the evening. He needed to get out of here. That was where he belonged, over there. The tallest tower across the inlet, the Tower of Eyes, blinked and flickered as the lights cycled through their stations, taking innumerable photographs and video clips every second to monitor the citizens of the city. The cameras could take photos from an unbelievable distance. He was sure that one had photographed him, just now, and every time he had stood at the window before. Some darkly comic part of his mind hoped that they had taken a good picture of him trying to kick through the window with his bare feet. The dent he had made in the window had since healed. The scars on his bed were no longer there, either.

He had an idea of where he was. He was probably in holding by the corporations for something. He was unsure of the crime he had been caught for. It was not a matter of his innocence; he had committed more crimes than he was able or cared to count during his career as an intel man. He had never heard tales of this type of prison though. He had never heard of the corporations using the experimental Compound X Y Z on its prisoners of espionage. The only time he had ever heard of the compound was from a black market drug dealer back when he was still with Siri. The drug dealer had ended up dead a few days later, and Rennan had thought nothing of it. And then Daniel Finn had brought it up for a second time with Siri.

Rennan had hated Finn. He had pretended to be friendly with him—and he knew that Finn had acted the same way, even before the slimy weasel had mentioned it to Siri in his dream—but ended up giving him incorrect information about everything to throw him off of Rennan’s trail. Finn underestimated him.

Even with all of that, even with their animosity disguised as amiability, Rennan knew he would not be able to do something as dire as kill Finn. Not before anyway. He had seen Finn threaten Siri, and while Rennan at least said he was confident of Siri’s ability to defend herself and take care of herself (even though he really did not think she could, not here on Geneda anyway), there was no excusing Finn for threatening the woman he loved. If Finn was actually still alive, he would have to kill him for that.

But Finn had also suggested that Rennan would be the one to kill Siri. There was no possible way. There was not. He would never harm a hair on Siri’s head, not even by accident. He had always treated her with the utmost care, even when she asked him not to.

But what if he was right?

Rennan’s head hurt. He conveniently found another glass of water and two nutrition pills against the wall. He took the pills without water, but drank the entire glass of water afterward in three big gulps. He sat back down on the bed and stuck the needle back into his arm. He realized as his eyes were closing that when all was said and done he would have a scar there, or several.

Maybe he would need a scarf around his arm.

Chapter 5: Prey Fallen Into A Deception

Daniel Finn was a man of business. Or, at least, that’s what he told people. He spun a rags to riches type of story whenever he told the story to others, just to make him seem like almost a more virtuous person than he was. People had a soft spot for rags to riches stories. He did not tell this story to Siri though. He respected her too much for that kind of nonsense. Besides, she had kept a pretty level head throughout most of their time together today; she deserved a reward of sorts.

“As I told you before,” he began, “I am an intel man. One of the best in the business. I have had over eight hundred and fifty three successful jobs in my career as such. I am the man that other intel men go to when they need help. As such, I will admit to feeling a little, shall we say, threatened when Rennan Praecjer began to earn his living doing the intel beat. This is something that he had a knack for, unlike anybody else I have seen before or since. I was honestly afraid that I would lose most of my clients to him. This is a trepidation on my part that he should feel honored to have, if not merely humbled by my expression.”

“So how did you and Rennan come into contact then? How long ago was it?” Siri leaned forward in interest, never breaking eye contact with Finn. Her scarf and jacket were still on. She did not feel like removing them.

“It was about a year ago.” Finn leaned back in the soft, black leather chair. He still held the gun in his hand, just in case. “Two men had hired us for the same job. We ended up deciding that the best course of action from there was to work together on it. This ended up being an excellent relationship for us to have—at least from my end. From that friendship (if you could call it that) I had an excellent vantage point into the life and workings of my biggest rival and closest competitor. We were never close as traditional friends go. I believe that Aristotle would consider our relationship one based purely on utility. He used me to help him on jobs, and I used him mostly the same way, but also to help out my independent business. Do you understand?”

“You essentially used your connection with Rennan to make your business seem more lucrative, is that right?” Siri asked.

“That’s correct.” Finn took a deep breath and let it out. “Sorry, I get short of breath sometimes. Where was I?”

“How did you come to the belief that Rennan Praecjer would be the one to murder you?”

A grin appeared on Daniel Finn’s face. “Tell me, Siri: have you ever heard of a chemical compound called X Y Z?”

Siri searched her mind for any recollection of the phrase. After a few moments, she shook her head. “No, I haven’t. Why?”

Finn reached his free hand into the deep pocket of his yellow and tan jacket and pulled out a vial of a liquid. The liquid shifted from purple to white in a pearlescent pattern in the light. The vial was just about large enough to fit into a small syringe; it was almost as large as his thumb.

“Compound X Y Z is an experimental compound being researched as a psychoactive drug. Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung believed in the power of dreams to help one figure out what was going on in his or her life, to understand the underlying causes of stresses that caused certain types of mental disorders. This compound was designed to help you travel back into your memories and see them once again, clear as day, to figure out why certain things bother you more than others to create certain mental disorders like dissociative personality disorder or clinical depression. However, the drug seemed to be much more powerful than they anticipated—though they will never admit it in public. Compount X Y Z can allow you to transcend the boundaries of your mind and witness the memories of other people, and also the futures that those people, and sometimes yourself, may have unfold before them.”

Siri was without words. She had never heard of such a thing before being possible. However, here on Geneda, it appeared that anything and everything was possible. Maybe it was some sort of thyer technology that leaked species borders and entered into human hands by accident. Maybe it had been designed to help them out, and this was just a side effect that it had on humans.

“However, “ Finn continued after a pause, “the things that people can see in their futures can always change. The future is never stable. One wrong step, one wrong breath, and it could be that everything that you had just seen will come true in a manner that is the polar opposite to what you were expecting. It’s a fickle business.”

“So you took some of this X Y Z stuff and saw Rennan kill you? That does not really seem like something that’s a feasible worry for you to have, Mr. Finn.” Siri chuckled, half amused and half trying to convince the other part of her mind that this was just a load of crap coming from a conman.

“Not exactly. You’re right, that does sound like a bunch of malarkey on your end of things, doesn’t it?” Finn chuckled nervously. “But I promise you that I’m not telling you lies. This is something that I’m legitimately concerned about. How can I prove to you that I’m sure of this vision? When you’re in it, you can almost feel when it’s a view of something that can be easily changed. This one was more concrete than anything I’ve ever experienced before. It felt more real than reality, Siri.”

Siri stared at him for a moment, trying to decide whether to believe him or not. On one hand, he was rambling on and on like a madman, bent upon a vision of a hallucination he saw when he was drugged up. She had never before heard of this Compound X Y Z, so she had nothing to go on from there. On the other hand, he had a gun; he was deadly serious about this. Given the chance, he would still have her at the top of the building. “Do you have all the necessary tools with you to administer this Compound X Y Z, Mr. Finn?”

“Of course. It’s contraband. I don’t want to leave this kind of stuff lying around. You understand.” Finn shot her a different kind of grin this time, a grin that said I know your secret. You can’t hide from me. I did my homework and you will never have the upper hand in these negotiations.

She felt the blood flee from her face, leaving her cheeks cold behind the thick white scarf. How did he know? She kept her composure nonetheless. “Let me try it. Then I will give you the information you need, if I believe this to be what you say it is. Deal?”

“Negotiating again, are we?” Finn thought it over for a moment. “Fine. You give Compound X Y Z a try. If that’s all you ask.”

“We will see what happens,” Siri said. She unfastened the large round buttons on her black coat and removed it. She rolled up the long sleeve of her long blue t-shirt. She left the scarf on. Finn put the vial of the pearlescent fluid into the syringe gun, primed it, and held the tip of the needle in the crook of her elbow. “No tourniquet?” she asked.

“Not necessary. Sweet dreams, Siri.” He pulled the trigger. She felt the drug erupt into her bloodstream. Very shortly after, she felt her eyelids become heavy. She allowed them to drift closed, and let the dream take her.

Chapter 4: Have Faith That I Can Change for You

“No matter what happens, don’t look down.”

Siri stood on the sharp edge of a platform overlooking most of the city. The building towered high above the streets; it actually was one of the tallest in the city itself, surpassed only by the Tower of Eyes. The Tower of Eyes was not actually a tower made up of eyeballs, but it saw everything as though it were made up of eyeballs. She was not sure what this particular building was called, or what its purpose was. All she knew was that it had a lovely marble interior and a very long elevator ride up to the place upon which she stood. She wished she could have entered the building under better circumstances, but the man had pressed the barrel of the gun to her side ever since she had gotten off the monorail train in Theremin Station. Now, she was trapped.

“What do you want from me?” she asked him. She did not look at him; that would require turning around, and she did not want to remind herself of the weapon he gripped in his hand.

“Everything,” the man replied. “I want to know everything about Rennan Praecjer. He is the man that will kill me one day. I want to prevent that from happening.”

The words made her spine stiffen. “Rennan would never kill anybody,” she said in as calm a voice as she could muster. “He’s a good person. He won’t kill you.”

“This is where you are wrong, Siri. Yes, of course I know your name,” he added in response to her second stiffening.”I’ve seen the future. And I know that Rennan will kill me unless we stop him. He will go away, far away, for a very long time afterward. And then he will look for you, because you will be next.”

Siri flattened her mouth into a straight line. This was getting a little ridiculous. The only feasible way out of this particular situation was to comply with the demands for information that the stranger had. Maybe she would give him good information, maybe it would be false. She had not decided upon that quite yet. His claims seemed a little far-fetched for her taste. How could anybody see the future with enough certainty to drive a woman to the edge of a tall tower in the middle of a city with a gun to her back? She simply did not understand the situation fully enough for her own comfort, and needed to know more. “What is your name, sir?” she asked in a very polite tone.

The man smiled. “My name is Daniel Finn.”

“What is your occupation, Mr. Finn?”

“I’m an intel man. The best around, as far as I can tell.”

“Can you explain to me how an intel man has enough time to do this variety of interrogation, sir?”

“No, I cannot. Sorry.” He shrugged. The stiff fabric of his shirt rustled crisply in the strong wind at the top of the tower. Siri’s hair had escaped from beneath the heavy white scarf and danced uncontrollably about her face.

“I will cooperate with you,” she said, still not sure if she actually would or not. “But can we please find a more agreeable setting to do this in? My face is becoming blistered by the wind, and I’m not very comfortable up here. I’d be a better help for you if I was comfortable, Mr. Finn.”

Finn chuckled. “That’s fine,” he said. “I’ve lowered my gun, you can turn around now.”

Siri turned and looked at the man. He was bald, but bald by choice and not by affliction. She could see tiny stumps of hair all across his scalp. He was neatly dressed in a pea coat, with a tie visible underneath the collar of his white shirt. The gun he carried was small, easily concealed, but still as deadly as any other, she knew. Rennan carried one very similar to it when he was working. The man stood a good foot or so taller than she, but had a generally warm face. It was as though his face was simply made for smiling. She was not sure if that was supposed to comfort her, or make her feel more uneasy than she already did.

Finn held out a hand, gloved in black leather, and she took it. She stepped away from the precipice and together they walked back toward the elevator. They stepped into the finely crafted box and the doors closed behind them silently. Finn pressed a button and the elevator began to descend back to the ground floor.

“First things first,” she said. “How is it that you are so sure that Rennan Praecjer is the man who will kill you?”

“I’m afraid that’s another trade secret, Siri. You understand.” Finn smiled.

“I would feel a lot better about giving you information if I knew I could trust the source of your confidence, Mr. Finn.”

“This is not about your clear conscience, my dear. This is about my life, and your life too, at this point.”

“This is also about the life of a man who I love,” she argued. “This is not about my clear conscience, this is about my willingness to give you good information. Who says I will give you anything worth your while if you don’t meet my demands in the same fashion that I am meeting yours?”

“This is not a negotiation, Siri.”

“Oh, but it is, Mr. Finn. Everything in life is a negotiation. Life is nothing more than a finely balanced game of catch. I will throw something your way if you throw something mine. So long as we both have something to hold, the world will remain balanced like the scales of justice. If not, then the world will tumble down into a maelstrom of chaos and where will we be left but to swim through that veritable shithole to try and find dry, stable land again?”

“You have an interesting view of the world, dear. I unfortunately disagree. I believe the world is in the hands of those who hold your precious little scales. Whoever it is that holds the scales also holds life in the balance. Right now, I hold the scales. I know what happens next. You do not.”

“But I would like to. Just tell me your goddamn source.”

“Maybe after some more time, I will,” Finn grinned.

The elevator stopped. The doors slid open once more.

Finn nudged Siri in the side with the barrel of the small gun, urging her forward. She shuffled  out of the capsule and back into the grand marble foyer. The receptionists’ table indicated that the location was a hotel of some sort. Two girls stood behind it, pretty girls, with tight blouses and short skirts. She did not like how all of the people in any sort of hospitality industry on this planet wore tight clothing to show off their “assets.” It made it hard for just anybody to take up a receptionist’s job anymore—you not only had to be of the proper mindset but you needed a good body as well—which seemed counterintuitive to how she was told things used to be. Maybe her conservative mindset showed that she was raised on Earth, where things tended to be a little bit more up-tight. The skin-tight fashion has stemmed from the tightness of the space travel suits that the first pilgrims had worn out of this planet. They had not known that the planet had already been settled as a hub of all civilizations with the capability of interstellar travel, but other species welcomed them with open arms. Rennan was born of this planet. He knew it inside and out. Siri was born on Earth and migrated here only a few years ago. She still did not understand this culture. Soemtimes she regretted coming out here. Other times she regretted not coming out sooner. Today she was of the former state of mind.

Finn escorted her over to a private sitting room against the wall. The foor of this room slid upward to cordon them off from the rest of the lobby. The door blocked out all of the chatter from the conversations of the patrons outside the room.

“Now,” Siri said, folding her hands on the table. “I believe you owe me an explanation, Mr. Finn.”