Subject:  Chapters 4, 5, and 6 |
Author:
Cynaera
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Date Posted: 08:04:30 12/22/01 Sat
In reply to:
Cynaera
's message, "P.J." on 16:13:05 12/20/01 Thu
Chapter Four
After coming up off the anesthesia and scanning the white walls of MedLab, P.J. had decided he didn’t want to be in any type of medical facility. He’d carefully taken the I.V.’s out of his wrists, stopped the bleeding, and groggily made his way out of the room, his eyesight blurred and his head humming. He hadn’t known what surgical procedure had been performed on him, and he really didn’t care – it couldn’t have been any worse than the radiation treatments he had been forced to endure in the past.
He’d been through the “interrogation process” as provided by Madeline. He’d told her everything he knew about Section and how he’d hacked into their databases. He’d even provided suggestions to safeguard the files from future invasion. He thought about the conversation between himself and Madeline. She’d seemed warm and beautiful and motherly. That illusion had been shattered when she’d taken his chin in her hand, leveled her eyes to his and said in a voice rich with threat and venom, “If you don’t tell me everything you know, I will break every bone in your body, one at a time. And if you faint, I will revive you so you will feel every ounce of pain.”
P.J. shivered as he thought about what she’d said, and the firmness of her hand on his jaws. “I’m not hiding anything!” he’d said to her, almost desperately. “I’m not a threat to you! Jeezus, I’m just a KID! Don’t you have a HEART?”
Madeline had relented then, and her expression had become almost tender. She had remained silent as he’d told her how he’d accessed Section One’s databases and why he’d done it. He told her about his mother, and his cancer, and how his mom dealt with his frequent nosebleeds and trips to emergency. How she was working two jobs to pay for the medical treatment he seemed to need to stay alive. How he only had a few short months left, and how he wanted to live every minute to the fullest, because he knew he’d never have another chance. By the end of the session, Madeline had released him, hugged him, and let him go. P.J. still could feel her arms around him, and it warmed him – Madeline had hugged just like his mother…
P.J. walked the corridors of Section One, unbound. He wore his baseball cap backwards, hiding the evidence of his radiation treatments. His jeans hung loosely on him – he’d lost weight and had not been provided alternate clothing, so he wore what he had been allowed to take into Section when he’d been brought in a week ago. As he strolled through the halls, his hands in his pockets, he thought about his mother. She would be hysterical with worry, he knew. Not knowing what had happened to him, or where he was, she was most likely combing the streets, sending out ads in every major paper, calling the police and the F.B.I.
P.J. felt tears rise to his throat. God, he wished he could be home again, even if it meant subjecting himself to that nurse who could never seem to find his vein when she took his blood. I’d give anything to be in my own bed tonight, he thought, and he couldn’t fight the tears anymore. In a darkened, abandoned corridor, P.J. slid to the floor, his back against the wall, wrapped his arms around his knees, and cried softly. “I’m only thirteen,” he sobbed, his eyes swollen, his nose running. “I’m only thirteen…”
Chapter Five
Birkoff said softly, “He’s on Level Five.” Nikita nodded curtly and left him hastily. She knew P.J. had to have been completely disoriented to end up in a restricted area like Level Five. She knew he didn’t know about the tracker which had been surgically implanted in him when they’d been testing him for cancer. His cancer had been confirmed, as Nikita had known it would be, but the tracker had seemed like, not a violation, but a protection for the boy. It would enable the people who truly cared about him to keep tabs on where he was, and to shelter him, if necessary.
She found P.J. on the floor, sobbing into his knees. Her heart went out to him instantly, and before she thought, she dropped to the floor beside him, taking him in her arms and hugging him close. “Oh, P.J….” she whispered, soothing him as she rocked him gently and let him cry. “Don’t be afraid – we won’t let anything happen to you…”
P.J. pulled out of her arms, his face flushed, his eyes liquid. “Who’s we?” he asked plaintively. “That dark-haired bitch who threatened to break every bone in my body? Those surgeons from hell who implanted me with a tracker?” Nikita was stunned. How had he figured it out? Before she could analyze it further, P.J. went on vehemently. “That silver-haired guy who thinks he’s Caesar? That guy you hang with who doesn’t talk?” Nikita, despite the severity of the situation, was hard-put to keep a smile from crossing her face at P.J.’s description of Michael.
He seemed to run out of energy then – his body wilted, and Nikita was alarmed for a moment. “P.J. – are you all right? Do you need—“
“—I don’t need anything from you!” he shouted angrily. “I just want to live! I don’t suppose your medical team can give me a few more years of life, can they?”
Nikita thought about her life – about Michael’s life, Walter’s, Birkoff’s, Madeline’s, Operations’ – and she wondered if they would ever know the pain P.J. was feeling. They all lived on the razor’s edge. They all knew that every second counted, that every breath could be the last. But – did any of them truly appreciate life? Even the limited life they all lived within Section constraints?
Did Michael ever relax enough to enjoy the smell of freshly-popped popcorn with real butter? Did Madeline ever stop to smell the roses she so meticulously pruned in her office? Did she ever venture out to smell the ones that grew wild in the park? Did Operations ever close his eyes and listen to a symphony from beginning to end and imagine himself playing the cello in the orchestra? Did Walter ever ride a Harley at eighty miles an hour across a straight stretch of highway with the wind in his face and a smile on his lips? Did Birkoff ever separate himself from Section long enough to surround himself with warm, loving people who only wanted to have fun?
Nikita was struck silent for a second. Then, pulling herself back to the boy’s question, she shook her head slowly, sadly. “No, P.J., they can’t.” She paused a second, then said, “But I know a way to make the time you have left the best days of your life.”
Chapter Six
P.J. stood next to Walter, watching as he built a tiny device which would blow up an entire city block. “But, if you use that configuration, you’ll short it out and it won’t work,” P.J. was saying. His small hand snaked around in front of Walter and pointed. “Put that wire there, and attach it here.” He put a finger on a spot on the circuit board, and Walter grunted.
“Kid, you’re right,” he muttered. “Dammit – where’d you learn that?”
P.J. snickered and wiped his face – it was too hot in this room. “I stayed awake in my astrophysics class.” His eyes were shiny and full of life. He liked Walter – the man treated him like an equal, not a kid, and together, in the last week, they’d created some definitely worthwhile explosives.
“I gotta go,” he said softly. “Too hot in here.”
Walter nodded, but even with his smile, he felt tears rising to his eyes. He knew P.J. was sick, but the kid was so full of life it was hard to believe he was dying. Walter growled, “C’mere, kid,” and when P.J. stepped closer, Walter pulled him into his arms and bear-hugged him, fighting to keep the tears from escaping.
P.J. finally squirmed free, peevishly adjusting his baseball cap and mock-glaring at Walter. “Geez, you’d think I was never coming back!” he quipped, and turned to leave before Walter could see the pain in his eyes – pain caused from that loving hug. I wouldn’t take a second of it back to keep from feeling the pain, P.J. thought, his eyes closed. Walter’s hug had strengthened him even as it had hurt him physically.
~~~
P.J. touched everyone, in some way. And the beauty and sorrow of it was that he didn’t realize he was changing people. He was just being who he was, for the short time he had left on earth, and it never occurred to him that everyone else wasn’t doing the same.
As he ambled through the stark corridors of Section One, bored and restless, wondering what would happen to him, thinking about his mother and how worried she must have been, he walked straight into Michael. Startled, P.J. stepped back with a gasp and an apology on his lips, then felt a shudder of fear at the dark man who towered over him. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, and made to leave hastily, wanting only to get out of Michael’s way before the man everyone called the “Dark Angel” grabbed him by the throat and took his life even more prematurely than the cancer promised to do.
To his surprise, Michael gripped both his shoulders, knelt down in front of P.J., and met his eyes. “Are you all right?” he asked in a hushed voice, his own green eyes searching for any sign of pain.
P.J. relaxed a little, and said, with false nonchalance, “Yeh, I’m fine.” He didn’t tell Michael that the collision had pulled the breath from his lungs and created a painful reverberation in him that almost knocked him to his knees. He didn’t want this legend of Section One to know he was weak, when, from what he’d heard about Michael, the man had survived insurmountable odds countless times. He was practically immortal – a god, according to the women. And, P.J. admitted silently, this Michael guy scared him.
He was stunned when Michael straightened up, left a hand on his shoulder, and said very softly, “Come with me, P.J.”
Ogod, now he’s gonna kill me! P.J. thought in horror. He felt the despair well up, and despite his bravado, tears leaked out from his eyes. He wanted to plead for life, but he knew it wouldn’t do any good. His life was short, anyway – he’d just hoped to live a little more of it with a little less pain…
Michael saw his fear and his tears, and he felt a wrenching in his heart. “Don’t be afraid,” he said, and his eyes were warm. “I’m not going to hurt you. I have something to show you.”
P.J. swallowed hard, fought to still his trembling, and battled the pain which had become a constant in his life lately. He regained some control and followed as Michael led him out of the hallowed halls of Section One and into the light of the world outside. “I want to take you to one of my favorite places,” Michael said, his hand still on P.J.’s shoulder. He led the boy to a car parked in the lot, opened his door, and let him in, then walked around to the driver’s side. Michael was surprised when P.J. leaned over and unlocked his door for him. At the question in Michael’s eyes, P.J. felt compelled to explain. “I used to do it for mom all the time.”
Michael swallowed tears. The boy was so much like he himself had been as a youth – concerned, brave, scared, thoughtful, eager to please and to teach… It almost killed him to know that P.J. would not be around much longer. There’s so much I wish I could show you… Michael thought, so much I wish you could know about what we do, about who I am – who I used to be…
They drove in silence for several miles, until P.J. broke the pensive quiet with a startling question. “Michael, you’re in love with Nikita, aren’t you?”
Michael fought to keep his expression blank and to keep the car from veering off the road He couldn’t think of a tactful way to avoid an answer or divert the directness of the question into something more vague. Silently, he thought, I’m about to tell you something I’ve never confessed to anyone, not even Nikita… Very quietly, almost reverently, he said, “Yes. I love her.” He glanced over at the child in the passenger seat, and was a little amazed to see an almost otherworldly wisdom in those stark blue eyes. P.J. already knew. Michael realized something so profound it almost rendered him senseless. It had taken the innocence of a child to bring out what he’d been keeping inside for so many years – he loved Nikita. And, as he drove P.J. to his favorite place when he wasn’t within Section constraints, Michael realized something else – Nikita needed to know how he felt. Time was short – P.J. was a painful physical reminder of how precious life was… It was something he’d buried so deeply in order to survive the Section mentality that he’d almost forgotten what it felt like to allow joy.
Now, in a sudden, astonishing epiphany, Michael knew he could no longer be the man he once was – the man Section had made of him. He was, almost against his will, traveling past that persona, to the man he’d been before he’d taken up the gauntlet of righteous freedom and the desire to live in an atmosphere devoid of oppression. Michael was changing – and all it had taken was a combination of irrepressible spirit in the body of a woman and the innocence of a child, in the body of a child…
~ ~ ~
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