"You look terrible."

      How could such a change come over a person in three days? Number 6, who thought he had witnessed the spectrum of abuses the Village could inflict on a person, was nonetheless shocked by Number 9's appearance. There wasn't a mark on her, but the physical transformation of her petite form was as profound as if she had been beaten to the point of disfigurement.

      "How sweet of you to say. Can I come in?" Her voice, while hoarse, was tinged with acid. At least, Number 6 thought with relief, some of her former spark survived within the fragile container that limped carefully through the open door of his cottage.

      He noticed that her eyes darted constantly while she moved, as if looking for concealed obstacles, and had acquired a permanent wary squint. She carried herself with the exaggerated delicacy of the infirm. At the first opportunity she reached out and grabbed the nearest solid object to support herself. When she turned slowly to face him he saw the unhealthy pallor of her skin, the minute, unconscious trembling of her lower lip. Her shoulders were stooped, her posture indifferent, even after she made a visible effort to stand straight.

      "It hurts a little to smile," she informed him, "but take my word that I am glad to see you."

      He was staring at her afflicted body as if she were a laboratory specimen. "What happened to you?" he asked, his voice gruff with concern and confusion. "Where have you been?"

      "Look at this," she said absently, ignoring his questions. She held up one hand, which shook as if tied to marionette strings. "A side effect of the seizures."

      "Seizures," Number 6 repeated. "What seizures?"

      Number 9 sank to a chair with a sigh. "It took me twenty minutes to walk over here today, you know," she said. "The other day it took less than five. Old people were racing past me." She looked at him seriously. "Can you get epilepsy from the water supply?"

      "I wouldn't put anything past them," Number 6 muttered. "When did the seizures begin?"

      "The morning after our last meeting," she said. "After we found poor Number...what was it? It's a little hard to think straight." Number 9 shook her head as if to clear it, then winced in pain. "I had a pretty good night's sleep, considering the day I'd had. I wanted to come over here. So many questions. Why? That was the main one. The only one that matters, I suppose. Not what the Village is, not how they do the things they do. But why? I just can't figure it out."

      "Greater minds than yours have tried and failed," Number 6 said quietly. He was beginning to sense the reason behind this particular ploy by the Village Masters, however, and felt a familiar flame of anger inside him.

      Number 9 continued wearily, "I was going to come see you, to ask you... But as I was about to leave my room, I collapsed. I felt the most intense pain, all over my body. I thought I would die of the pain alone. Then it went away, as suddenly as it began. But I was weak as a kitten. I couldn't even get up. I just lay on the floor where I'd dropped for the rest of the day. I slept for hours, and when I woke up I was fine.

      She took several deep breaths, as if the effort of speaking exhausted her. Number 6 waited in silence as seconds passed. At length she resumed her story.

      "I've been having these...attacks ever since. They're not all the same. Some are small - like getting a stitch in your side. Some are huge. I thought I was having a heart attack once. Another time it felt like a blow to the head with a meat cleaver. Every time I've had less and less strength afterwards. Now, whenever a muscle twitches or my nose tickles, I'm afraid I'm having another one. It's kind of draining." She looked at him. "That's irony. As I said, it hurts to smile."

      "How often do they occur?" Number 6 asked urgently.

      "It varies," she said. "After the first one, I didn't have another all day. Yesterday - was it yesterday? - I had three within an hour. Totally unpredictable. I finally forced myself to come here because I was afraid to face them by myself any more. I hope you don't mind."

      Before he could respond, Number 9's face, already a mask of misery, suddenly froze. Her body convulsed, and a cry of agony escaped her gaping mouth. She shuddered explosively, as if invisible electric wires had abruptly sent lethal voltage through her defenseless limbs. The assault continued for several seconds, then ended with the abruptness of a switch being thrown. Number 6 watched helplessly as she slumped to the floor. The only movement in her huddled form was the shallow rise and fall of her breathing. He bent over her and felt for a pulse; it was rapid and thready, but already stabilizing.

      Consciousness came to her in a series of lapping waves. Finally her eyes fluttered open and stayed open long enough to fix on his, floating above. The look of despair on her face was more than Number 6 could stand. He crossed the room and barked a number into the telephone.

      "I'm calling a truce," he snapped. "Whatever you're doing, stop it now. You know damn well what I'm talking about. Call it off, and I'll listen to whatever you have to say. You heard me. I'll be right there." He slammed the receiver down, and only with an effort of will restrained himself from hurling the entire phone across the room.

      "Don't leave me alone," Number 9 said weakly. She had pulled herself to a sitting position on the floor but seemed unable to stand.

      "You'll be fine." The rage drained from his voice as she reacted with apprehension to his brusque words. "They've cast their lure, and the fish has responded to the bait. Nothing will happen to you here. You have my word." He reached out tentatively and brushed a tear from the corner of her eye. She smiled, despite the pain it caused. "Stay here," he told her. "Don't leave this house."

      "That shouldn't be a problem," she said gravely.

      The image of Number 9's agony burned in his mind all the way to the Green Dome. His sharp knock was answered at once by the silent, diminutive Butler who guarded Number 2's door. Number 2 himself was waiting serenely in his chamber. "My dear chap," he greeted Number 6. "You sounded quite upset when you called."

      "I should leap across that desk and strangle you with your own scarf," the Prisoner growled. "What do you think you're doing?"

      "That's not much of a bargaining position to start from," Number 2 chided him.

      "There will be no bargaining," Number 6 said, beginning to pace. "You will stop inflicting torture on Number 9, whatever you're doing, however you're doing it. And you'll tell me the reason behind this transparent plot you've hatched to use her to get to me."

      "Yes, I'll tell you, and you'll listen," Number 2 said agreeably, "and you'll tell me to go to hell, as you've done so many times before. Why should this time be any different?" He stood and walked around the console. "Except that it is different, Number 6. This time, it is."

      Number 6 stopped his restless pacing and glared at the broad-shouldered bureaucrat who stood before him. "How?" he demanded.

      "From now on, my dear chap, everything is going to be different." The hearty, booming voice of Number 2 had dropped to a tone of cold command. "Because of this."

      A moment later Number 6 fell to his knees, clutching his head as waves of pain slammed into his skull. From within the throes of agony he summoned a memory of the unauthorized scan that had left his hand burned and blistered days earlier. That had felt like this, but where was it coming from now? Was this what had been happening to Number 9, over and over again? How had she withstood it?

      Answers were impossible while in the excruciating grip of the assault. He had no way to combat the pain, but just as he felt consciousness begin to slip away from him, the pain ended. His strength left him at the same instant, and he struggled to keep from collapsing at the feet of Number 2.

      When he finally, shakily pulled himself to a standing position, Number 2 was looking at him with the same serene expression. "Your friend Number 9 is a remarkable woman," he said. "Three days of attacks like that, and she's still ambulatory. She has reserves of strength I never dreamed of. It's a shame she has to die."

      At first Number 6 appeared not to have heard. His eyes were muddy and unfocused. He blinked them furiously to clear his head. "What did you say?" he grunted.

      "Number 9 will be liquidated soon," Number 2 said without emotion. "I can't budge on that one, sorry. My orders are quite explicit. Already supposed to have happened, actually. I've stuck my neck out just to keep her around this long."

      "Why?"

      "All in good time," Number 2 replied. "Don't you want to know how I..." He gestured toward Number 6, who was still unsteady on his feet from the invisible onslaught.

      "If you think I'm going to crack just because you've discovered some new instrument of torture," he said, "think again. You were right: I am going to tell you to go to hell."

      "Oh, I know," Number 2 nodded. "You'd let us kill you before you cooperated. But I can't do that." He took a step backward and reached for something behind his desk. It was a calibration scanner. Number 6 eyed it warily. "Do you happen to know what your status is?"

      Number 6 smiled faintly. "Orange," he said. "What does it mean?"

      "It means 'preserve at all costs,'" Number 2 said with something like admiration in his voice. "An extremely rare designation in the Village. But don't get a swelled head: There are no other special perquisites attached to it."

      "Imagine my disappointment," Number 6 said dryly. "So what?"

      "So I could hound you literally to your grave, and you'd only take your secrets with you, and I would have severely compromised my own career prospects needlessly," said Number 2, fiddling carelessly with the buttons on the scanner.

      "Number 240's status," he continued, "was green. 'Expendable at our discretion.' There are many, many status green citizens in the Village. Most of them very nice people, and some quite useful, even, but in the end just more mouths to feed.

      "And poor Number 9's status is blue. 'Designated for liquidation.' She doesn't really know anything that could be of use to us...or our enemies. She wouldn't even be here if she hadn't - " Number 2 waved his free hand dismissively. "Well, that couldn't possibly be of interest to you."

      Number 6 said nothing.

      "In any case," Number 2 said with a shrug, "she has served one useful purpose in her short stay with us. She has a personality and a temperament that I judged - correctly - to be likely to arouse your sympathies. That has allowed me to stage a rather elaborate demonstration, which has been successful, and to offer you a proposition, which I hope will be equally so."

      "What is that thing?" Number 6 interjected, indicating the calibration scanner with a contemptuous nod.

      "This is a scanner for reading electronic data encoding at a cellular level," Number 2 said, unperturbed by the interruption. "Everyone in the Village has been encoded and entered into a master database. It'll save us mountains of paperwork. No more credit cards, no more bulky paper files on individual citizens. I thought you knew that."

      "A deadly weapon in the wrong hands," Number 6 observed, holding up his bandaged right hand.

      Number 2 chuckled. "Not unless you hit someone in the head with it. Sorry, Number 6, your little mishap with one of these devices was just a clever illusion. I didn't want to tip my hand too soon. The device had nothing to do with it. All part of the demonstration I was telling you about."

      "Get on with it, then," Number 6 said impatiently.

      "Very well. At the time you, Number 9 and, incidentally, Number 240 were encoded in your sleep, you - and you three only - were also implanted with an experimental receptor. Very tiny, very sophisticated. It resides in your wrist, just beneath the skin near your pulse point. At a signal from a special transmitter, it can stimulate your neural pathways to trigger a wide variety of pain responses - from mild abdominal cramps to cranial seizures."

      A cold blue gleam of understanding dawned in Number 6's eyes. "With yourself at the controls, I suppose?"

      "During the experimental phase, yes. Had to make sure the devices work as designed. But the Supervisors will be trained in their use, as well. After all, they will be administering the next phase of the project on a daily basis."

      "And just what is that?" Number 6 asked.

      "The Village is streamlining, my dear chap," the Chief Bureaucrat explained. "Even we are not free from budgetary constraints and concerns over efficiency. Got to run a tight ship, you know. Operation Status Check will help us to achieve that goal...for the good of everyone in the Village, of course."

      "Of course," Number 6 said dryly.

      Number 2 continued, "The operation consists of two phases. The first was encoding every citizen. Even I have been encoded."

      "Status green?" The Prisoner's tone was mocking.

      Number 2 smiled indulgently and ignored the question. "The second phase will involve implanting every citizen with the special receptor I've told you about. This will allow us to take therapeutic measures when necessary with extraordinary precision on an individualized basis."

      "Beautifully put."

      "Thank you." Number 2 had resumed his paternal air. "Once everybody is carrying what we call the Phase 2 device, we can achieve our final objective."

      "Which is?" The effects of the neural assault on Number 6 were dissipating, but the memory of searing pain lingered. He recognized the potential of such a tool in the Village, and it sickened him to think how his captors might put it to use. Still, Number 2's next words took him by surprise.

      "To deactivate the Rover system."

      "Oh?" Number 6 kept his voice carefully neutral.

      Number 2 tossed the calibration scanner casually onto the console. "Surprised, Number 6? You've experienced for yourself what the receptor can do. Its effects are less showy than Rover's ministrations, granted, but the results are remarkably similar. And with every citizen implanted with the device, there's no need to dispatch a guardian after every infraction. The touch of a button, and..." He trailed off, a look of satisfaction on his rugged features.

      Silence descended on the chamber as Number 6 mulled over this unexpected twist. His mind was reeling with all that Number 2 had told him: about Number 9, about the despicable surgical procedure that had been performed on her, and on himself, while they slept, about the "experiment" that had produced such agony in both of them. His hatred of the Village reached new heights. He fought an impulse to tear open his own wrist and remove the wretched Phase 2 device...and then perform the same operation on Number 2's throat. It would accomplish nothing. They'd only send in a replacement to wear the badge, and Operation Status Check would proceed as planned.

      He stared impassively at Number 2 and forced himself to speak lightly. "Did Rover receive a negative performance review?"

      Number 2's grin was soulless. "It's an expensive system to maintain," he said. "Requires a lot of resources to keep it going, and does not provide infallible performance in return. In short, Rover is simply not as efficient as point-of-origin neural discipline."

      "What is Rover?" Number 6 asked, and got only a condescending smile in return. He doesn't know...or he's afraid to say.

      "So Rover is going to be fired, laid off, made redundant...what is the proper term?"

      "Deactivated," Number 2 said flatly. "For the good of the Village."

      "Yes, I hadn't forgotten," Number 6 snapped. "What about Number 9?"

      "Ah, yes," Number 2 nodded, "that brings us back to the proposition I mentioned." He returned to his command chair and pressed a button on the console. On the huge viewscreen that covered one wall of the chamber, the image of Number 6's living room appeared.

      Number 9 was still there. She had settled herself awkwardly in a chair and sat motionless, her narrow shoulders bowed. Very little remained of the defiant, confident individual Number 6 had seen on the beach her first day in the Village. He shot a glance at Number 2, who was watching the screen with clinical fascination.

      "Observe, Number 6."

      With the touch of another button Number 9 was wracked with paroxysms of pain. She clung to the chair in an effort to withstand the latest assault, but the expression on her pale face was one of surrender. Before Number 6 could cry out in protest, Number 2 voluntarily lifted his finger from the panel. The pathetic image of Number 9 remained on the screen, but he turned away from it indifferently.

      "I'll kill you if you do that again," Number 6 said matter-of-factly.

      "Do stop being sentimental and listen to me." Number 2's voice was smooth and brutal. "Number 6, the time has come for you to cooperate with us."

      "My 'cooperation' for her life?" He spit out the words.

      Number 2 shook his head impatiently. "Number 9 is going to die. Period. Forget about her. She has served her purpose as a demonstration, and it's time to move on. You see, in a matter of days, Number 6, every man, woman and child in the Village will be implanted with the same device she is carrying."

      The significance of the words hung in the air between them like a poisonous vapor.

      "So now it's down to simple blackmail?" Number 6 said in a low, hate-filled voice.

      "Your sense of melodrama never fails you, does it? From my perspective, it's simply a vaccination program. Immunizing you from future urges to disrupt the Village. Booster shots to be administered as needed."

      "To innocent people."

      Number 2 waved off the comment as if it bored him.

      "This is all part of the master plan?"

      "Actually, I call this part of the plan phase 2a, and it's my idea," said Number 2 with a trace of pride. "I think I can succeed in, er, converting you where my predecessors have failed. Rather brilliant, if I say so. After all, you don't want the entire Village to suffer for your obstinacy, do you?"

      "You don't need these bloody devices to inflict pain on people," Number 6 said harshly. "Why should I respond to your scare tactics just because you've found a new toy?"

      "It's a matter of scale," Number 2 replied with a smile. "Scale and efficiency. Despite what you may believe, we never could be everywhere at once." He leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers in front of him. "Now we can."

      Number 6 began to respond, but Number 2 cut him off. "Perhaps I was wrong to term this a proposition. You seem to have taken it to mean you have some room for argument, or choice, in the matter. The facts are these. The implantation phase begins next week. Once the first of your fellow citizens is under our neural control, any subterfuge or lack of complicity on your part will result in swift, physical reprisals on your neighbors. They will suffer, just as you’ve seen Number 9 suffer."

      He pointed toward the double doors of the chamber. "That will be all, Number 6. Go home and think about it, or don't. I don't care. This time, there's nothing you can do."

 

      The next few days passed in a haze of uncertainty and impotent rage for Number 6. More acutely than ever he felt his every movement was being scrutinized, his every utterance analyzed. He fought against the temptation to censor himself in any way. It would be, he realized, the first step toward bending to the will of the Village. Operation Status Check be damned, he would not bend.

      The attacks on Number 9, meanwhile, had ceased. Far from reassuring him, however, the lull only heightened his awareness that the next neural assault on the fragile young woman would undoubtedly be fatal. Number 6 briefly considered attempting to remove the device from her wrist, but realized he couldn't risk the possibility that the implant contained some kind of anti-tampering feature that might do irreparable harm.

      Instead he kept vigil, installing Number 9 as his house guest, rarely letting her out of his sight. It was an exercise in futility, and he knew it. Number 2 was right: There was no recourse against the devices. Their assaults were unpredictable and unpreventable, and unlike Rover, didn't even allow the spiritual solace of putting up a fight. Number 6 wondered grimly if the Village masters appreciated that aspect of their new technology, or if it was simply an added bonus to their vicious machinations.

      While he watched over Number 9 and brooded over his predicament, he heard nothing further from the Green Dome. Apart from a vague sensation of relief, he didn't give the silence much thought. When Number 2 was ready to act out the next scene in this drama, he would make his plans known. Number 6 had no intention of forcing his hand without a firm plan of his own. But nothing workable even began to suggest itself as frustrating hours lengthened into days.

      "You don't blame yourself for any of this, do you?" Number 9 asked as they had tea on the sun-drenched terrace overlooking the beach.

      "I hadn't given it much thought," he shrugged.

      "Liar," she said, rolling her eyes. Some of her strength and spirit had returned after several days free from electronic molestation. She remained weak, her movements stiff and tentative, but the shadow of fear had receded from her features. Number 6 hadn't told her the details of his conversation with Number 2, nor the significance of her blue status. She believed the truce he had called for still held. What was the point of telling her otherwise?

      "You never did tell me what they want from you," she added, stirring sugar into her tea.

      "They want information," Number 6 said automatically.

      Number 9 considered this. "Why don't you just give it to them?" she asked.

      "Because I choose not to."

      There was a long pause. Then she said, "I don't blame you."

      "Thank you."

      The companionable silence that followed was split moments later by the clarion call of the public address system. A familiar voice, slightly distorted by amplification, announced, "Number 6, to the Green Dome. Urgent. Repeating, Number 6, to the Green Dome. Urgent."

      Reluctantly he took Number 9 back to his cottage and left her there. He crossed the square with determined strides to answer his summons. The Supervisor, the Butler and Number 110 were gathered in the elegantly appointed waiting area outside Number 2's chamber. They regarded Number 6 with worried eyes.

      "What's going on?" he asked, instinctively on guard.

      The Supervisor stepped forward, clearing his throat nervously. "Rover is holding Number 2 hostage," he said without preamble.

      "I beg your pardon?" Number 6 raised his eyebrows, incredulity and amusement in his expression.

      Number 110 pushed the Supervisor aside. "It won't let any of us in there," she said impatiently, gesturing toward the inner chamber. "We sent in two guards to get Number 2 out. They never came back."

      "We were preparing to shut down its support matrix," the Supervisor interjected. "Because…well, you know why. It knew, too, although I don't how it could. I received a distress call from Number 2 in the Control Room. The final command to deactivate the Rover system has to come from him. It won't let him give it."

      "I see," Number 6 said, utterly baffled. Rover, turning against its masters? Whatever the thing was, it had a self-preservation instinct. He felt no sympathy for the otherworldly guardian, whose brutality was well-known to him. Still, he thought with dawning realization, Rover was, with regard to what Number 2 had called "efficiency and scale," now the lesser of two evils. Could he bring himself to join forces with it - whatever it was – against the Village?

      "What on earth do you want me to about it?" he asked the assemblage of Village staffers.

      "Number 110," said the Supervisor, glancing apprehensively at the steely aide, "believes that Rover can distinguish between warders and prisoners. It knew the guards we sent in were, well, against it."

      "But Rover must know you, as a prisoner, can't shut it down," Number 110 concluded. "So we want you to go in there and distract it long enough to let Number 2 get out, so he can deactivate the bloody thing."

      Number 6 looked thoughtful. "You're scared to death of it, aren't you?" he said.

      "We have our orders, and we will carry them out." There was anger in Number 110's eyes, but there was fear there, too.

      "Without my help," Number 6 said curtly, turning to go.

      His hand was on the doorknob when he heard Number 110's voice behind him: "How is Number 9 these days?"

      He hesitated, emotions at war on his face. Number 110 came up behind him. In a flat voice only he could hear, she said, "Don't misinterpret what I'm about to say. My job is to get the damn support matrix shut down, and I'm going to do just that, by any means necessary. But if you find yourself in a position to dictate terms while you're in there, that's your concern. Do you understand?" She stepped away and looked at him expectantly, her face carefully composed.

      Without a word he pushed past them and through the door to Number 2's chamber.

      "Looks as if you've got morale problems," he greeted the Village master cheerfully. Number 2 was seated in his command chair, his rugged face unusually drawn. Two bodies in anonymous striped shirts were laid out on the floor near the console. Off to one side, emitting a low, ominous wail, was the strange spherical watchdog. It drifted a few inches toward Number 6, then stopped. Number 6 watched it out of the corner of his eye.

      "Did you have a hand in this?" Number 2 demanded querulously.

      "Don't be an idiot," Number 6 said. "I'm only the sacrificial lamb." He took a few steps toward Rover, looking more confident than he felt. "If you ask me, I don't think you'll be able to outrun it, even with me as a distraction."

      As if in agreement, the guardian crossed the chamber with otherworldly speed, until it was mere inches from Number 2, who cringed away from its undulating surface.

      "Then we're both doomed!" he cried, his voice a shadow of its former booming self. "Both of us!"

      "Oh, I don't know about that," Number 6 said casually. "It's not my problem if you've got a disgruntled employee on your hands."

      "Well, what can I do?" Number 2 implored.

      Number 6 pretended to give the matter serious thought. "Give in to its demands?" he suggested.

      "Demands? What the devil are you talking about?" Number 2 glanced nervously at Rover and checked himself. "What do you think it wants?"

      "Perhaps I’m just partial to the idea, but I’d guess it wants to be left alone."

      "You mean not deactivate the Rover system? Out of the question. It’s not in the budget." Number 2 folded his arms across his chest, but his gesture of defiance was somewhat mitigated by the cautious posture he assumed in Rover’s proximity.

      "Ah, yes, streamlining the Village," Number 6 nodded. "Can’t maintain two separate search-and-destroy systems. One of them will have to go."

      A sly smile pulled at the corners of Number 2’s mouth. "I see. You have some interest in seeing Operation Status Check fail, of course. But you’ve got no cards to play here, Number 6. You will help me, here and now, to deactivate Rover. Or Number 9 dies, here and now." He extended his hand over the innocuous button on the console that would trigger the fatal assault.

      "According to you, she’s going to die anyway," Number 6 snapped, despising the words as he spoke them. But he saw a glimmer of hope. He could protect Number 9 – he knew he could – if only he could remove the damn neural implant as a factor. Had Number 2 just said he had no cards to play? He realized that, in fact, he did.

      "I’ll help you," he said calmly, "but you won’t like my advice. Call your superiors. Tell them there’s been a problem with the new system, and it will have to be shut down indefinitely."

      "You’re mad," Number 2 snorted. "They’ll have me removed, thank you very much. In any event, it won’t help you. My successor will pick up where I leave off, and the neural receptors will become a reality."

      "Yes, but your successor won’t pursue the angle of using them against me, will he?" Number 6 said, his voice quietly hypnotic. "You said yourself that part of the plan was your own embellishment." He thought about what Number 110 had told him in the waiting room and took a calculated risk. "Does it have enough support out there to go on in your absence? I don’t think so. In which case, it doesn’t matter to me whether the Village has Rover or implants or some other systematic means of subduing its citizens. It’s six of one, half a dozen of the other."

      Number 6 sat down on the edge of the console, reached out and picked up the telephone. "Call," he said, "or I’ll walk out of here, and Rover can have you for a plaything."

      "I’ll kill you right now," Number 2 warned him.

      "Which would solve all of my problems," Number 6 smiled, "and none of yours."

      At that moment Rover inched forward still closer to Number 2; its keening wail intensified threateningly. Number 2 regarded it with renewed terror. He appeared to weigh the unpalatable options before him. Finally he turned away from the guardian and reached for the phone. Number 6 listened to the conversation with satisfaction:

      "This is Number 2…There has been a problem with Phase 2…We haven’t tracked it down yet…Total system-wide failure…Have to take everything off-line…I don’t know…Indefinitely…Yes, sir, I know…The experimental phase was a success, yes, but…Well, we still have Rover, sir…Yes…Yes, sir…Not as sorry as I am, sir…Be seeing you."

      The two men locked eyes for a long moment. "Operation Status Check has been put on hold," Number 2 said wearily. "The entire infrastructure will be taken off-line within an hour."

      Number 6 wondered what Rover’s reaction to this development would be. But the spherical guardian was gone. It had simply disappeared. Unnerved, the Prisoner nonetheless suppressed a smile of triumph. "It appears you’re free to go," he said.

      The double doors of the chamber slid quietly open as he approached. He ignored the questioning looks of Number 2’s staff and exited the Green Dome with purposeful strides. Outside the day was warm and fair, the winding streets filled with pleasant, faceless Village citizens. To Number 6 it still resembled a battlefield, but today the light breeze seemed to carry a hint of victory, and the casualties bore the insignia of the enemy.

      The door to his cottage swung open before him. He could tell Number 9 everything now. They were safe. There was still the matter of status blue, of course, but they would have to physically come and get her now. He would keep them at bay, and then he would work out a way to drive them back entirely. But for now, the threat from the unpredictable neural receptors was dead. The entire system would be shut down in an hour…

      But an hour, it turned out, was too long for Number 9. It had taken Number 2 less than a second of retributional rage to punch the button that delivered the fatal impulse to her system. She had succumbed even before Number 6 had cleared the steps leading away from the Green Dome.

      He stood over her lifeless form, finally free from pain, and closed her sightless eyes. Then he went outside to watch the waves disappearing over the knife edge of the horizon, to the place where she had been a name. In time a burial detail came to collect the body. There was a grave with her number on it, and they would make sure she found her way into it.

The End

© 1998, Theresa Donia. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

 
"Status Check" Part 1       "Status Check" Part 2

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