Vox Mentis

The soldiers go in and soon there is an explosion on the roof of the hospital. This is a problem. You can tell because at first Masters emits updates at intervals of fifteen seconds - who is where, doing what, and for how long they are expected to do it; a nonstop cataloging of physical facts that he seems to enjoy on a deep, sexual level - then, for no reason, a whole minute goes by with no updates at all. This manifests in Plath as a series of increasingly dramatic hair corrections, and finally a question, and Masters turns his goggles toward her and says in his machine voice, “We’re trying to fix target location.”

“I thought you had target location,” Plath says. Masters doesn't answer. “Did we not start with target location?”

“Eliot is slippery,” you say.

“We are not having another Portland.” Plath directs this at Masters, but what Masters thinks of it was unknowable. You kind of hope Masters will become so pissed off with Plath that he will unsnag one of what had to be five or six different weapons strapped to various parts of his body and do something unspeakable with it. Thoreau, Thoreau, you think, as you do at times like this. You jerk.

You rise from the table. The front glass is very dirty but you can see through it. A chopper is still hovering above the hospital, but aside from this, nothing seems to be happening.

“We’re regrouping,” says Masters. “We may have a new fix.”

“You get a fix,” says Plath. “You get a fucking fix right this second or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.” Her face is flushed. Globules of sweat form a neat line all along her hairline. She's displaying an awful lot of emotion for a poet, which makes you think that Plath has reason to believe the consequences for failure are particularly terrible. You keep watching the road. You need to think like Eliot. You know him better than most. You can imagine Eliot skulking around out there, sniffing you out. That’s what he’ll be thinking about. Not escape. He will be coming for you.

A black-suited soldier emerges from the crossroad and jogs toward the burger place. “Who is this guy?” you say. Nobody answered, so you try again. “Who the fuck is this fucking guy?”

Plath comes up beside you. “Speaking for myself, I don’t mind adding a little manpower to this location.”

Masters says, “We’re redrawing our zones.”

This sounds like bullshit to you, because if your current location has become part of Masters’s operational zone, that would have been something he would have mentioned. Soldiers moving locations: That's all he talks about. You eye the approaching guy. “Oh,” you say. “That’s Eliot.”

“That’s... that’s impossible,” says Plath. But there is uncertainty in her voice. Plath is beginning to realize what you've known for a while: that you cannot underestimate Eliot. Every time you think you have him figured out, you don’t. “Let’s... let’s get some security here, huh?” Plath reaches across you to Masters, who might be barking orders over his internal radio or might be just standing there; it's impossible to tell. “Masters. Masters.”

“Unit is not responding.” Masters draws a fat pistol. “May be hostile. I advise retreat.”

Plath vanishes. You hesitate. You really do want to face Eliot and end him. But this is not the way to do it: with Eliot in heavy body armor, filtered against compromise. There is taking a risk, and there is suicide. You turn to follow Plath, then have another thought. There is always the possibility that this is another layer of sneakiness. Eliot could have deliberately sent someone who would be spotted - the exception, perhaps, or just a soldier he managed to overcome - toward the burger place from the front in order to flush you out the back. That is just the kind of thing that Eliot might do. You consider. There's a side door, leading to the dumpster. You decide to be prudent.

You push your way outside. The brick wall of the adjoining store faces you. This is the kind of thing you like: a closeted escape route. This, right here, is your element. Then you stop, because it occurs to you that maybe this is a problem. Maybe the last thing you want to do in this situation is follow your instincts, since those might be predictable to someone who knows you very well. Eliot steps around the corner.

“Shit,” you say.

Little yellow plugs poke out of Eliot’s ears. He's holding a pistol. His eyes are wide and there is a sheen of sweat on his face that tells you he's put himself into a heightened mental state. Poets can do this, if they really want. You've seen them do it. They talk and move very rapidly for about an hour, then sleep for days.
“Gotcha,” says Eliot.

You hold up your hands. You want to speak, but it seems like if you open your mouth, he'll shoot you. He'll shoot you anyway, of course. That's why he's here.

You face each other a moment. Maybe some guys will come through the door and take care of Eliot. That would be super handy.

Eliot wiggles the plugs out of his ears with his free hand. “I had to render the exception unconscious. He couldn’t be trusted.”

“Okay,” you say.

“I blame myself for what happened. I should have stopped it.” You don’t know what to say to that. “I have to kill you.”

You nod. It's been like this for a while.

His fingers flex on the pistol. “I’m sorry I didn’t teach you better.” His expression is very strange.

“Eliot,” you say.

“You have to stop.”

“Eliot.”

There are soldiers approaching. You can feel them. This idea is distressing in a way it wasn’t a few moments ago.

“I made mistakes,” he says. Around you, soldiers boil out of the air like ants. There is a great deal of noise and Eliot has every opportunity to shoot you but he doesn’t and he falls down and dies.