“That’s not what happened.”
“No one will believe mind control, Vivienne. And, yet…if such a thing were possible, it would be quite the sword to wield, wouldn’t it? You wouldn’t want to cross anyone who held it.”
She says nothing.
“If someonedidwield that power, I bet they could use it for good, too. Erase the memory of what you just witnessed. Would you like that, Vivienne?”
Silence.
The voice continues, “Peace of mind would come at a price. The price of your loyalty as an employee. We would implant a subconscious terror of leaving the company. You would, at some level, understand that if you left, we’d be forced to reveal your forgotten secret. Should you try to leave, we would need to bring you back in for a reminder. I can assure you, though, that few need reminders. Very few.”
Fran Lee did. That’s what Vivienne had seen in the older woman’s eyes. Repeated exposure to whatever horror she’d committed while under the company’s control. Exposure and erasure, corroding her mind, disintegrating her memories.
“Do you want us to erase that memory for you, Vivienne?”
No. Consciously or not, shehadmurdered her own child. She must pay for that.
When she doesn’t respond, the voice says, “Imagine if we don’t erase it. Would you tell your husband? Inflict the horror on him? Or would you abandon him and your children? Rob them of their mother? Destroy their happy family life?”
She cannot return to them with this secret. She knows that. She can’tlivewith this secret. And yet, how would Marco cope with her suicide, never knowing the reason? How would her children deal with it, knowing only that their mother abandoned them?
You took one child’s life. Will you ruin the lives of the other two?
“Your choice, Vivienne?”
She doesn’t have one. She sees that. No choice at all.
“I’ll take it.”
Viviennewaits as one wall of her booth whooshes open. She steps out to see Kate, shaking her head and saying, “Well, that was lame, wasn’t it?” and one of the guys murmuring, “No shit,” as they all share a smile.
The Game turned out to be an embarrassingly low-tech virtual reality chess match, where they’d had to lift and move giant chess pieces. Erika was right. It needed a design overhaul, stat.
The players swallow their mockery as six board members walk in. The man at the head of the group welcomes them to the team and says they’ll each receive a brief orientation, with details of their new benefit packages. Oh, and there’s one last thing…
“Here at the company, we’re always looking to retain talent. Yet we aren’t always in the best position to recognize that talent. You are the ones in the trenches, seeing promise overlooked every day. So, before you leave, I’d like you each to nominate someone for the next Game. Consider it the first taste of your new executive power.”
One of the board members takes Vivienne to a lounge. As they sit, he says, “Do you have a name for us? Or do you need more time?”
“I do but… It might be inappropriate.”
He smiles. “We’ll be the judge of that.”
“He’s talented, brilliant and an insanely hard worker. He’s just not in a division the company often recognizes with executive promotions.”
“Ah, an innovative choice. Always the best kind. You don’t need to make excuses, Vivienne. Just give us a name.”
She takes a deep breath and says, “I’d like to nominate my husband. Marco.”
The Screams of Dragons
“And the second plague that is in thy dominion, behold it is a dragon. And another dragon of a foreign race is fighting with it, and striving to overcome it. And therefore does your dragon make a fearful outcry.”
—Cyfranc Lludd a Llefelys, translated by Lady Charlotte Guest
When he was young, other children talked of their dreams, of candy-floss mountains and puppies that talked and long-lost relatives bearing new bicycles and purses filled with crisp dollar bills. Bobby did not have those dreams. His nights were filled with golden castles and endless meadows and the screams of dragons.
The castles and the meadows came unbidden, beginning when he was too young to know what a castle or a meadow was, but in his dreams he’d race through them, endlessly playing, endlessly laughing. And then he’d wake to his cold, dark room, stinking of piss and sour milk, and he’d roar with rage and frustration. Even when he stopped, the cries were replaced by sulking, aggrieved silence. Never laughter. He only laughed inhis dreams. Only played in his dreams. Only was happy in his dreams.
