Post by architeuthisdux1 on Dec 7, 2006 16:40:49 GMT -5
Nathan is a prisoner, and no one can bail him. One day, a stranger approaches him, offering him a second chance, as long as Nathn agress to the stranger's terms, to come with him wherever he goes. He does this, and follows him to a small building. What happens to him him there will change him forever....
There was no light in prison. Only a few were so luck as to have the barred window in their cell, a permanent reminder of their imprisonment, always torturing them by having the light of the outside world shine upon their face. He had no barred window in his cell, and almost always he felt glad of this. Today, Nathan thought, was going to be no different from any other day. He would wake up, spend time in his cell, eat lunch, run around and such in the exercise yard, it was all so monotonous. But today was different. Today, a guard approached his door.
He had done nothing wrong; he was a very good prisoner. He could not be sentenced to death, for his offenses were minor, it was quantity of them that had forced him into prison, and due to the multiple bails which needed to be posted. Anyone in his immediate family could do nothing for him, and no one else bothered to offer. For that reason, he could not be leaving jail, so he was left to guess upon the reason the guard was approaching him. His eyes lit up and he leapt from the cold, hard cot when the guard took out a set of keys and opened the door. The guard said, “There’s someone who wants to talk to you. Follow me to the visitor’s center.”
Nathan obeyed the explicit commands of this man, and followed him past the other cells, filled with intently focused inmates. After a short walk he came to the visitor’s center, the glass window between him and the world. All that connected him to it was the phone. Once he sat down, the man opposite him who had a short haircut, wore a business suit, and had cold, gray-blue eyes. The man picked up the receiver and began to speak into it, and Nathan followed suit and listened.
He said, “Hello, Nathan Johnson. I am Thomas Smith. You may call me Tom.”
Nathan replied, surprised that the man knew his name, “All right, Tom. I have one question for you. Why are you visiting me? I have never seen you before in my life. Are you related to me somehow?” Nathan could see no facial resemblance, or anything else for that matter, but he did not know how deep the ties of his family went. Tom responded, “I am not related to you in any manner that I am aware of. I came here because I want to offer you a second chance.”
“What do you mean? Are you going to bail me out?”
“Yes, but that is not all I plan to do.”
“What do you want from me then?
“I want only for you to come with me after you are released from this prison. That is all I ask, to accompany me in exchange for you freedom. Now, don’t those seem like reasonable terms?”
Nathan could not help but to be convinced. He nodded in consent. Tom said, “Good. Now that you have agreed, I can arrange to release you, but that shall not place take right now. Goodbye, for now, Nathan.” And then the mysterious man, his savior, left.
For the remaining hours until his departure from his prison, the very thought of it brought joy to everything he did. Nothing could crush his spirits. He was excited for the chance to continue his life once more. This thought carried him through the four hours until the guard came again, and released him from his cell, and brought him to Tom. Tom was standing there, same suit, same unrelenting eyes, yet a thin smile cut across his face. When Nathan came to him, he shook his hand and asked, “How does it feel to be a free man, Nathan?”
“I feel incredible. I feel as if I have been dead for all my imprisonment and you have brought me back to life. I cannot thank you enough for you kind deed.”
“All I ask is that you adhere to the conditions of our agreement. You must come with me.”
Nathan acquiesced, and he was led into the parking lot and into the man’s car. It then drove away from the prison. Yes, finally he was gone! Never again would he return to that awful, boring place. He did not at all pay attention to where he was going; he only looked behind him, at the slowly shrinking building he had resided in for so long. That building he was never to enter again.
They passed through the town, passing easily through the traffic, and after about fifteen minutes at this easy driving pace, they arrived at their destination. It was white, square, one floored building, about the size of a post office. There were a few windows, covered, however, by thick blinds. Tom got out of the car, and Nathan hesitated for a moment. He did not know this man, and therefore could not trust his intentions or motives. There was, however, no way he could escape, the car was off, he had the keys, and he was too close. Tom asked, “Are you coming, Nathan?” He responded by opening the car door and walking towards the small building.
Inside there was something akin to a scaled-down waiting room, like that in a doctor’s office. Nathan was soothed by the calming shades of blue that were spread across the walls. Nathan was told to wait here, and so sat down in a chair. He waited for about five minutes, and then Tom returned. Tom told him, “Follow me into this room.” He quickly obeyed. Upon entering the door, however, he was faced with unfamiliar surroundings. The wall shades changed from pleasant blue to cold, hard grey concrete. All around him was scattered various equipment, some kind of monitor, a chair, and many other random objects. Before he was able to fully take in his surroundings, Tom came up to Nathan, and inserted a needle into his arm, and said, “Thank you for you cooperation. It is much appreciated.” Nathan then saw no more.
II
His eyes fluttered open. Strange settings met him, alien settings that he did not remember coming to. What, what did he remember. No memory he had of a life before he woke up now. He sat up in the chair, trying to think of the reason he was even here. Suddenly, the door opened, and a man entered. He was wearing a typical doctor’s outfit, but his eyes, they pierced him, the gray-blue eyes cut right through him.
This man said, “Hello. I am Doctor Smith. Your surgery has gone well. Daniel Jones, it seems that you’re teeth are fine.”
“Why, then, don’t I remember anything?” Daniel asked.
“I see no reason for that. You must have reacted strangely to the anesthesia.”
Daniel nodded in consent, and then asked, “What surgery?
Dr. Smith paused, and then said, “We found you on the road, and you had a cut on your arm. I was on my way to my office, and so I put you in my car, and drove you there. I manage to upkeep a small surgical institute in this office of mine; I even added a scaled-down waiting room for the atmosphere. My staff of only a few people operated on you and sewed you back together. Look at your arm.” He pulled up his sleeve and found a scar there. “That will heal in due time. Now, you may go. If you don’t remember your address, here it is.” Smith handed him a slip of paper. He then walked out of the building and found a car there.
As Daniel pulled out, he saw another car, and the sight of it gave him a headache. It was not ugly or very bright, but something about it triggered a psychological response in him. He could place it, so he ignored and drove out. At a stop sign, he unfurled the slip of paper, which listed convenient directions, which told him he had gone the right way so far, but to turn left at this intersection. He did so, and then followed the next direction, which was to follow the road for 1.5 miles, and then turn right. Doing so brought him to a small apartment complex. He was at the ninth room on the second floor. He went up to this and found a small yet comforting room, which was actually a main living room, separated from the kitchen by a counter, and a bedroom. He did not remember any of this, but listened to the words of the doctor. He turned on the TV and began to watch the news.
He woke up the next morning, and realized that he didn’t work anywhere, and to keep this apartment he would need a job. He saw an ad in the paper for a school needing a new custodian, and the address was given. With that, he could manage to find the school and seek an application. He would have to wait until later that day, so he wasted the rest of his day watching the television. It was a completely mind-rotting experience, but he did it anyway, for lack of something else to do. Something in a few of the programs, however, provoked the same psychological response that the car did, and that gave him a headache, but he continued watching anyway.
He drove to the school, and found that there were no students left. The doors were locked, so he knocked on them and waited patiently for someone to come. A tall, thin female teacher let him in, and he asked her where the office was. She kindly pointed him in the right direction. He came to the office, and asked the first person he saw about the application, who then told him who to talk with. After conferring with the person and reasoning out the terms, filling out the application, and being asked about previous employment and life. He had none, at least none that he could remember, so the person was slightly suspicious, so told Daniel that he got the job, but any minor offense would get him to lose it. Daniel thanked the man, who said he started tomorrow.
He drove home; feeling accomplished, and then went to his apartment, and watched more television, until he fell asleep. He had strange dreams, none of which he remembered. He woke up early in the morning and drove to work. He felt he had a purpose at that school, he was needed, and without him, the place would be filthy. This sense of purpose excited him, and work was not chore for him, but a blessing, and he began to know well many of the children who chose to converse with him.
Something was happening, however, as he fixed up his life. As he worked out the many details of his existence, he began seeing familiar things. He looked at things he had never seen before, and yet these caused pangs of remembrance in him. His mind attempted to warp around these strange feelings, but these attempts only gave him migraines. The fact that he knew what the things were, but that he could not place them tortured him, and yet he tried as he hard as he could to keep a pleasant persona, and yet still these pangs subtracted from his benign nature.
One particular instance of these pangs he could not forget. He was in his apartment, when, he looked out of the window and saw a car. This triggered something in his mind, something that he began to become familiar with and loathed. It was a far more extreme case in this instance, however, because after the headache he experienced he fell unconscious. When he woke up, he was far away from his apartment, and he realized that he was in front of the local jail. His car was in the lot, his keys in his pocket, so he simply drove away and disregarded the incident. Incidents like these were rare at first, but their number increased steadily as time passed. This significantly reduced his benevolent nature, and reduced his qualifications so much that he had no choice but to quit his job. He could still pay his rent for a little while more, but he would need another job soon.
He managed to get one at a gas station near his apartment. This job managed to enlighten him somewhat; he got to know several people in the town very well and it gave him a renewed sense of purpose. The blackouts, however, became a common factor during his stint at this job, and he could do nothing about it. He would most often end up in front of the prison, and sometimes in the process of shoplifting from a shopping mart or something similar.
Why he did these things he did not understand. As far as he could remember, there was nothing he could have ever done that would have inspired him to walk to a prison or stealing from a store. He strove to understand, and wrote down all of his dreams, which were always of events like this. Other than this, he could do nothing, and Daniel tried simply to live out his life as normal as possible, which became increasingly more difficult.
One day, while working at the gas station, he was serving a customer, a man he had become to know very well named Matthew Tyler. This man would come into the station every morning and get a cup of coffee, a task that Daniel delighted to assist in. One day, however, as he was serving the coffee, he blacked out. When he woke up, he found himself in a back alley a mile away from his work, a few dollars in his hand, and Matthew, lying on the ground, beaten, bruised, and mangled. He was faintly croaking. Daniel could not believe what he had done. He had just mugged one of his most frequent customers, and, more importantly, one of his only friends. He had no choice, however, but to hastily stuff the dollars back into Matthew’s pocket, and abandon him, for he could not risk being caught. He did, however, alert the proper authorities of Matthew’s location, and departed from the gas station as soon as the call was completed.
He could not go back to his apartment. He could not go back anywhere familiar. Despairing and lonely, he drove aimlessly and ended up near a small white building. Another immense pang and, no blacking out this time! The darkness faded from his eyes, his very nature was shaken and then fell from him, his mind was now clear. All the qualities of his former self returned to him, and the self he had taken up during the previous interval faded completely away. Memories of that interval, he had only a few yet, and these were of his criminal surges. After a few minutes, however, everything became clear.
He realized what had happened, and became aware of the blackouts he experienced during the presence of his other self. They were he, trying desperately to escape from the prison it had been forced into, and now he had succeeded. Everything he saw around him that made him painstakingly remember had been triggering the memory of his former self, and this pained him, his mind was split. The pangs became blackouts, Nathan was slowly breaking out from Daniel, and on this last one he had finally escaped from the prison of his mind. He was free! But now, he had to find the man who had done this to him.
During this revelation, Thomas Smith was sitting in his office, staring out the window, weighing his options. He could not risk confronting him, or sneaking through the front or any window. But fortunately, there was a back entrance, and his only chance was this. He watched Nathan approach the front door, he snuck carefully to the storage confines of his room, and if he made his way through them, he would reach the back door, and perhaps make it across the field and come to the town. Thomas was too loud, and when Nathan opened the door and cocked his ears to detect even the slightest noise, he was heard. He then sacrificed silence and ran to the door, and exited to the outer field.
Nathan was only a few feet behind him, however, and he quickly caught up to him when Thomas attempted to sprint out to the field. Nathan stopped Thomas, and demanded, “Tell me what you have done to me!” There was no escape for Thomas now, so he acquiesced, and they walked slowly back to Thomas’ office. There, Thomas told Nathan everything. “It was an experimental procedure I had developed. I worked for a very large company, and they gladly funded very aspect of my endeavor. I managed to convince them of the benefits of a personality reconstruction procedure, and they found it under their policy, ‘Working for the global advancement of mankind through science.’ It was quite simple, actually. After that, all I needed was someone I could test it on, someone that was corrupted, enough so that I could prove that my procedure worked but also not too much so that I could have them legally. That left me with few options, and you turned out to be the best candidate.”
Nathan sat in silent reflection on the man’s words, and the anger bubbled secretly inside him. He blurted out, “Did you know of any side effects!?”
Tom said, “Of course not. You were my first human test subject. I would use you to determine the side effects, and I found them. The room you stayed in, I obtained for you, and then set up hidden recording equipment. I also put some in your car, and with this I was able to determine your location, and I watched you as frequently as possible. I was able to determine that my procedure does taper out eventually, and that I need to strengthen its effects somehow if I am to continue to receive funding from the company, which calls itself GAM, which stands for “The Global Advancement of Mankind.” I appreciate your working with me.”
Using a few seconds to absorb what had just been said, Nathan replied, “Are you saying that I volunteered!? If so, I am afraid you are mistaken! You bailed me out of jail, and in my extreme naivety and excitement for being released from that awful place, I disregarded logic and common sense. I have every right to tell the world about what you have done!”
With a stone-cold face and a sigh, Tom responded, “I’m afraid you can’t do that, Nathan. Don’t you see! There is no one who will believe you. As far as I or anyone else is concerned, you have always been who you are now, and there is no evidence to prove that, except the evidence I hold. I will continue with this procedure and will not reveal your misbehavior against the law. Have a good day, Mr., what was your last name?”
Nathan refused to disclose it.
“Ah. Well then, have a good day, Nathan. You may keep the car and the apartment, at least for as long as you are able to pay for your room.” Nathan drove home.
Several months later, Nathan had a new, low-paying job in town and still resided in the apartment, but planned to upgrade himself in just a few weeks. The car he still had, and he had heard nothing from the mysterious doctor who had given him a new personality a few months before. Thomas Smith, however, was at the local jail.
George stared at the man in the business suit, and his cold, gray-blue eyes pierced him. The man asked him, “How would you like to have a second chance?”
There was no light in prison. Only a few were so luck as to have the barred window in their cell, a permanent reminder of their imprisonment, always torturing them by having the light of the outside world shine upon their face. He had no barred window in his cell, and almost always he felt glad of this. Today, Nathan thought, was going to be no different from any other day. He would wake up, spend time in his cell, eat lunch, run around and such in the exercise yard, it was all so monotonous. But today was different. Today, a guard approached his door.
He had done nothing wrong; he was a very good prisoner. He could not be sentenced to death, for his offenses were minor, it was quantity of them that had forced him into prison, and due to the multiple bails which needed to be posted. Anyone in his immediate family could do nothing for him, and no one else bothered to offer. For that reason, he could not be leaving jail, so he was left to guess upon the reason the guard was approaching him. His eyes lit up and he leapt from the cold, hard cot when the guard took out a set of keys and opened the door. The guard said, “There’s someone who wants to talk to you. Follow me to the visitor’s center.”
Nathan obeyed the explicit commands of this man, and followed him past the other cells, filled with intently focused inmates. After a short walk he came to the visitor’s center, the glass window between him and the world. All that connected him to it was the phone. Once he sat down, the man opposite him who had a short haircut, wore a business suit, and had cold, gray-blue eyes. The man picked up the receiver and began to speak into it, and Nathan followed suit and listened.
He said, “Hello, Nathan Johnson. I am Thomas Smith. You may call me Tom.”
Nathan replied, surprised that the man knew his name, “All right, Tom. I have one question for you. Why are you visiting me? I have never seen you before in my life. Are you related to me somehow?” Nathan could see no facial resemblance, or anything else for that matter, but he did not know how deep the ties of his family went. Tom responded, “I am not related to you in any manner that I am aware of. I came here because I want to offer you a second chance.”
“What do you mean? Are you going to bail me out?”
“Yes, but that is not all I plan to do.”
“What do you want from me then?
“I want only for you to come with me after you are released from this prison. That is all I ask, to accompany me in exchange for you freedom. Now, don’t those seem like reasonable terms?”
Nathan could not help but to be convinced. He nodded in consent. Tom said, “Good. Now that you have agreed, I can arrange to release you, but that shall not place take right now. Goodbye, for now, Nathan.” And then the mysterious man, his savior, left.
For the remaining hours until his departure from his prison, the very thought of it brought joy to everything he did. Nothing could crush his spirits. He was excited for the chance to continue his life once more. This thought carried him through the four hours until the guard came again, and released him from his cell, and brought him to Tom. Tom was standing there, same suit, same unrelenting eyes, yet a thin smile cut across his face. When Nathan came to him, he shook his hand and asked, “How does it feel to be a free man, Nathan?”
“I feel incredible. I feel as if I have been dead for all my imprisonment and you have brought me back to life. I cannot thank you enough for you kind deed.”
“All I ask is that you adhere to the conditions of our agreement. You must come with me.”
Nathan acquiesced, and he was led into the parking lot and into the man’s car. It then drove away from the prison. Yes, finally he was gone! Never again would he return to that awful, boring place. He did not at all pay attention to where he was going; he only looked behind him, at the slowly shrinking building he had resided in for so long. That building he was never to enter again.
They passed through the town, passing easily through the traffic, and after about fifteen minutes at this easy driving pace, they arrived at their destination. It was white, square, one floored building, about the size of a post office. There were a few windows, covered, however, by thick blinds. Tom got out of the car, and Nathan hesitated for a moment. He did not know this man, and therefore could not trust his intentions or motives. There was, however, no way he could escape, the car was off, he had the keys, and he was too close. Tom asked, “Are you coming, Nathan?” He responded by opening the car door and walking towards the small building.
Inside there was something akin to a scaled-down waiting room, like that in a doctor’s office. Nathan was soothed by the calming shades of blue that were spread across the walls. Nathan was told to wait here, and so sat down in a chair. He waited for about five minutes, and then Tom returned. Tom told him, “Follow me into this room.” He quickly obeyed. Upon entering the door, however, he was faced with unfamiliar surroundings. The wall shades changed from pleasant blue to cold, hard grey concrete. All around him was scattered various equipment, some kind of monitor, a chair, and many other random objects. Before he was able to fully take in his surroundings, Tom came up to Nathan, and inserted a needle into his arm, and said, “Thank you for you cooperation. It is much appreciated.” Nathan then saw no more.
II
His eyes fluttered open. Strange settings met him, alien settings that he did not remember coming to. What, what did he remember. No memory he had of a life before he woke up now. He sat up in the chair, trying to think of the reason he was even here. Suddenly, the door opened, and a man entered. He was wearing a typical doctor’s outfit, but his eyes, they pierced him, the gray-blue eyes cut right through him.
This man said, “Hello. I am Doctor Smith. Your surgery has gone well. Daniel Jones, it seems that you’re teeth are fine.”
“Why, then, don’t I remember anything?” Daniel asked.
“I see no reason for that. You must have reacted strangely to the anesthesia.”
Daniel nodded in consent, and then asked, “What surgery?
Dr. Smith paused, and then said, “We found you on the road, and you had a cut on your arm. I was on my way to my office, and so I put you in my car, and drove you there. I manage to upkeep a small surgical institute in this office of mine; I even added a scaled-down waiting room for the atmosphere. My staff of only a few people operated on you and sewed you back together. Look at your arm.” He pulled up his sleeve and found a scar there. “That will heal in due time. Now, you may go. If you don’t remember your address, here it is.” Smith handed him a slip of paper. He then walked out of the building and found a car there.
As Daniel pulled out, he saw another car, and the sight of it gave him a headache. It was not ugly or very bright, but something about it triggered a psychological response in him. He could place it, so he ignored and drove out. At a stop sign, he unfurled the slip of paper, which listed convenient directions, which told him he had gone the right way so far, but to turn left at this intersection. He did so, and then followed the next direction, which was to follow the road for 1.5 miles, and then turn right. Doing so brought him to a small apartment complex. He was at the ninth room on the second floor. He went up to this and found a small yet comforting room, which was actually a main living room, separated from the kitchen by a counter, and a bedroom. He did not remember any of this, but listened to the words of the doctor. He turned on the TV and began to watch the news.
He woke up the next morning, and realized that he didn’t work anywhere, and to keep this apartment he would need a job. He saw an ad in the paper for a school needing a new custodian, and the address was given. With that, he could manage to find the school and seek an application. He would have to wait until later that day, so he wasted the rest of his day watching the television. It was a completely mind-rotting experience, but he did it anyway, for lack of something else to do. Something in a few of the programs, however, provoked the same psychological response that the car did, and that gave him a headache, but he continued watching anyway.
He drove to the school, and found that there were no students left. The doors were locked, so he knocked on them and waited patiently for someone to come. A tall, thin female teacher let him in, and he asked her where the office was. She kindly pointed him in the right direction. He came to the office, and asked the first person he saw about the application, who then told him who to talk with. After conferring with the person and reasoning out the terms, filling out the application, and being asked about previous employment and life. He had none, at least none that he could remember, so the person was slightly suspicious, so told Daniel that he got the job, but any minor offense would get him to lose it. Daniel thanked the man, who said he started tomorrow.
He drove home; feeling accomplished, and then went to his apartment, and watched more television, until he fell asleep. He had strange dreams, none of which he remembered. He woke up early in the morning and drove to work. He felt he had a purpose at that school, he was needed, and without him, the place would be filthy. This sense of purpose excited him, and work was not chore for him, but a blessing, and he began to know well many of the children who chose to converse with him.
Something was happening, however, as he fixed up his life. As he worked out the many details of his existence, he began seeing familiar things. He looked at things he had never seen before, and yet these caused pangs of remembrance in him. His mind attempted to warp around these strange feelings, but these attempts only gave him migraines. The fact that he knew what the things were, but that he could not place them tortured him, and yet he tried as he hard as he could to keep a pleasant persona, and yet still these pangs subtracted from his benign nature.
One particular instance of these pangs he could not forget. He was in his apartment, when, he looked out of the window and saw a car. This triggered something in his mind, something that he began to become familiar with and loathed. It was a far more extreme case in this instance, however, because after the headache he experienced he fell unconscious. When he woke up, he was far away from his apartment, and he realized that he was in front of the local jail. His car was in the lot, his keys in his pocket, so he simply drove away and disregarded the incident. Incidents like these were rare at first, but their number increased steadily as time passed. This significantly reduced his benevolent nature, and reduced his qualifications so much that he had no choice but to quit his job. He could still pay his rent for a little while more, but he would need another job soon.
He managed to get one at a gas station near his apartment. This job managed to enlighten him somewhat; he got to know several people in the town very well and it gave him a renewed sense of purpose. The blackouts, however, became a common factor during his stint at this job, and he could do nothing about it. He would most often end up in front of the prison, and sometimes in the process of shoplifting from a shopping mart or something similar.
Why he did these things he did not understand. As far as he could remember, there was nothing he could have ever done that would have inspired him to walk to a prison or stealing from a store. He strove to understand, and wrote down all of his dreams, which were always of events like this. Other than this, he could do nothing, and Daniel tried simply to live out his life as normal as possible, which became increasingly more difficult.
One day, while working at the gas station, he was serving a customer, a man he had become to know very well named Matthew Tyler. This man would come into the station every morning and get a cup of coffee, a task that Daniel delighted to assist in. One day, however, as he was serving the coffee, he blacked out. When he woke up, he found himself in a back alley a mile away from his work, a few dollars in his hand, and Matthew, lying on the ground, beaten, bruised, and mangled. He was faintly croaking. Daniel could not believe what he had done. He had just mugged one of his most frequent customers, and, more importantly, one of his only friends. He had no choice, however, but to hastily stuff the dollars back into Matthew’s pocket, and abandon him, for he could not risk being caught. He did, however, alert the proper authorities of Matthew’s location, and departed from the gas station as soon as the call was completed.
He could not go back to his apartment. He could not go back anywhere familiar. Despairing and lonely, he drove aimlessly and ended up near a small white building. Another immense pang and, no blacking out this time! The darkness faded from his eyes, his very nature was shaken and then fell from him, his mind was now clear. All the qualities of his former self returned to him, and the self he had taken up during the previous interval faded completely away. Memories of that interval, he had only a few yet, and these were of his criminal surges. After a few minutes, however, everything became clear.
He realized what had happened, and became aware of the blackouts he experienced during the presence of his other self. They were he, trying desperately to escape from the prison it had been forced into, and now he had succeeded. Everything he saw around him that made him painstakingly remember had been triggering the memory of his former self, and this pained him, his mind was split. The pangs became blackouts, Nathan was slowly breaking out from Daniel, and on this last one he had finally escaped from the prison of his mind. He was free! But now, he had to find the man who had done this to him.
During this revelation, Thomas Smith was sitting in his office, staring out the window, weighing his options. He could not risk confronting him, or sneaking through the front or any window. But fortunately, there was a back entrance, and his only chance was this. He watched Nathan approach the front door, he snuck carefully to the storage confines of his room, and if he made his way through them, he would reach the back door, and perhaps make it across the field and come to the town. Thomas was too loud, and when Nathan opened the door and cocked his ears to detect even the slightest noise, he was heard. He then sacrificed silence and ran to the door, and exited to the outer field.
Nathan was only a few feet behind him, however, and he quickly caught up to him when Thomas attempted to sprint out to the field. Nathan stopped Thomas, and demanded, “Tell me what you have done to me!” There was no escape for Thomas now, so he acquiesced, and they walked slowly back to Thomas’ office. There, Thomas told Nathan everything. “It was an experimental procedure I had developed. I worked for a very large company, and they gladly funded very aspect of my endeavor. I managed to convince them of the benefits of a personality reconstruction procedure, and they found it under their policy, ‘Working for the global advancement of mankind through science.’ It was quite simple, actually. After that, all I needed was someone I could test it on, someone that was corrupted, enough so that I could prove that my procedure worked but also not too much so that I could have them legally. That left me with few options, and you turned out to be the best candidate.”
Nathan sat in silent reflection on the man’s words, and the anger bubbled secretly inside him. He blurted out, “Did you know of any side effects!?”
Tom said, “Of course not. You were my first human test subject. I would use you to determine the side effects, and I found them. The room you stayed in, I obtained for you, and then set up hidden recording equipment. I also put some in your car, and with this I was able to determine your location, and I watched you as frequently as possible. I was able to determine that my procedure does taper out eventually, and that I need to strengthen its effects somehow if I am to continue to receive funding from the company, which calls itself GAM, which stands for “The Global Advancement of Mankind.” I appreciate your working with me.”
Using a few seconds to absorb what had just been said, Nathan replied, “Are you saying that I volunteered!? If so, I am afraid you are mistaken! You bailed me out of jail, and in my extreme naivety and excitement for being released from that awful place, I disregarded logic and common sense. I have every right to tell the world about what you have done!”
With a stone-cold face and a sigh, Tom responded, “I’m afraid you can’t do that, Nathan. Don’t you see! There is no one who will believe you. As far as I or anyone else is concerned, you have always been who you are now, and there is no evidence to prove that, except the evidence I hold. I will continue with this procedure and will not reveal your misbehavior against the law. Have a good day, Mr., what was your last name?”
Nathan refused to disclose it.
“Ah. Well then, have a good day, Nathan. You may keep the car and the apartment, at least for as long as you are able to pay for your room.” Nathan drove home.
Several months later, Nathan had a new, low-paying job in town and still resided in the apartment, but planned to upgrade himself in just a few weeks. The car he still had, and he had heard nothing from the mysterious doctor who had given him a new personality a few months before. Thomas Smith, however, was at the local jail.
George stared at the man in the business suit, and his cold, gray-blue eyes pierced him. The man asked him, “How would you like to have a second chance?”