Vox Mentis

NOW dance. Make them think you're crazy. Lower their guard.

Clearly these guys aren't backing down. Time for extreme measures. You begin dancing slowly, mostly just hopping on one foot, like they wanted. You were never a great dancer, so you're willing to incorporate their suggestion.

The tall man rolls his eyes. "We're not idiots, Nick. Nice try though."

You stop. "Look, I'm not..." You search for the word. Rich? Kidnappable? "Anybody. I'm a carpenter. I make decks. Gazebos."

"Yes, that's why we're here, your exemplary work with gazebos. Look, you can drop the act. We know who you are. And they know who you are, and they're here, so let's get the fuck out while we can."

You take a moment to choose your words, because you get the feeling you're only going to have one more shot at this. "My name is Nick Parsons. I'm a carpenter. I have a girlfriend and she's waiting outside to pick me up. I don't know who you think I am or why you stuck a... a thing in my eye, but I'm nobody. I promise you I'm nobody."

The short man had been packing equipment into a brown satchel, and now he slings it around one shoulder and peers into your face. He has thinning hair and anxious eyebrows. Normally, you might have pegged him as an accountant or something.

"Tell you what," you say. "I'll just stay here. You can go, I'll stay here for twenty minutes, and then I'll forget all about you. It'll be like we never met."

The short man glances at the tall man.

"I am not the guy," you say. "I am not the guy."

"The problem with that little plan, Nick," says the tall man, "is that if you stay here, in twenty minutes you'll be dead. If you go to your girlfriend, who I'm sorry to say you can no longer trust, you'll be dead. If you do anything other than come with us now, quickly and cooperatively, again, I'm afraid, dead. It may not seem like it, but we are the only people who can save you from that." His eyes scan yours. "I can see, though, that you're not finding this that persuasive, so allow me to switch to a more direct method." He holds open his coat. Tucked against his side, nose down in a thigh holster, is a short, wide shotgun. Briefly you wonder how the hell he got a shotgun in an airport. "Come or I will shoot you through the fucking kidneys."

>agree to fully cooperate! I mean, why not. What's the worse that could happen?

If you say you aren't going to cooperate they'll probably just knock you out right here. So, pretend to agree, then we'll bolt and make trouble at the first opportunity.

"Yes," you say. "Okay, you make a good point. I'll cooperate." The key is to et out of the restroom. The airport is full of security. Once you're out, a push, a yell, some running: That's how you'll escape.

"Nope," says the short man.

"No," says the tall man. "I see it. Dope him up."

~

A door opens. On the other side of it is a world of malformed color and muted sound, as if something's stuck in your ears, eyes, and possibly brain. You shake your head to clear it, but the world gets dark and angry and won't stay upright. The world doesn't like being shaken. You feel your feet sliding away from you on invisible roller skates and reach for a wall for support. The wall curses and digs its fingers into your arm and is probably not a wall. It is probably a person.

"You gave him too much," says the person.

"Safe than sorry," says another person. They are bad persons, you recall. They're kidnapping you. You feel angry about this, although in a technical kind of way, like taking a stand on principle. You try to reel in your roller skate feet.

"Jesus," mutters a person, the tall one with calm eyes. You don't like this person. You've forgotten why. Wait no. It's the kidnapping. "Walk."

You walk, resentfully. There are important facts in your brain but you can't find them. Everything is moving. A stream of airport people breaks around you. Everyone going somewhere. You had been going somewhere. Meeting someone. To your left, a bird twitters. Or a phone. The short man squints at a screen. "Rain."

"Where?"

"Domestic Arrivals. Up ahead." You find this idea amusing: rain in the terminal. "Do we know a Rain?"

"Yeah. Girl. New."

"Shit," says the short man. "I hate shooting girls."

"You get used to it," says the tall man.

A young couple passes, gripping hands. Lovers. The concept seems familiar. "This way," says the tall man, steering you into a bookstore. You come face-to-face with a shelf that says NEW RELEASES. Your feet keep skating and you put out a hand to catch yourself and feel a sharp pain.

"Problem?"

"Possibly nothing," murmurs the tall man, "or possibly Rain, passing behind us now, in a blue summer dress."

In glossy covers, a reflection skips by. You try and figure out what stabbed you. It was a loose wire in the NEW RELEASES sign. The interesting thing is that being stabbed is helping clear the fog in your head.

"Busiest part of any store, always the new releases," says the tall man. "That's what attracts people. Not the best. The new. Why is that, Nick, do you think?"

You prick yourself with the wire. It's too tentative, you can hardly feel it, so you try again, harder. This time a blade of pain sweeps through your mind. You remember needles and questions. Your girlfriends, Melinda, is out front in a white SUV. She's going to be in a two-minute parking bay; you had arranged that carefully. You're late, because of these guys.

Now's a good a time as any to try and make your move. What do you do?