Day 262 - Repeat Offenders - Chapter 13.3 - (1089 words)

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REPEAT OFFENDERS

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 13.3

“Did you have to do that?” Brian Two was tending to Brian Prime, and more than one person in the room was looking intently at the pair of men, wondering if they would be able to tell them apart when they separated. One of them was in severe shock following the release from his pain, and was curled on the ground and the other was leaning over him and trying to get him upright, trying to get him comfortable enough to finish the explanation they were waiting for about the other incapacitated man.
Ivan Two, the one who had been with Mike, the one who only now was realising all the pain and death he had dealt, believing in the ability to reset time, was permanent and real. Which meant he had killed the girl he had been sleeping with to get information about the bank. She had somewhat been forgotten about since the bank manager had piggybacked along with them on the jobs, but she had been there in the first few runs on the bank. He had shot her, executed her with not feeling at all.
The act of putting her out of her misery, seemed less merciful now and more cold, dispassionate. He didn't live her, she was a means to an end, but she was a real live human being with everything to live for. He had snuffed that out, in the world they came from, or one of the copies? Ivan had lost track of who he had killed and when. He was not keeping score, it was pointless because none of the killings existed.
Except he was lied to, supplied the most convenient of stories for Brian to carry out whatever it was that he needed to … Ivan was not even sure what it was the scientist was up to. Cancer, that was not cancer, dying of some … shit even that may have been made up. Barbara's face loomed up in his mind and remained there, transparently superimposed on his view of the two Brian's on the floor. He could still see which one of them was injured, which one was the lying bastard that drove all of this along. There was no way that he would let him not be brought to account, justice was a misnomer, but a settling of accounts, that would be real enough. There would be a small chance that he would confuse them all, he was a smart enough to see the potential in hiding in plain sight on the hope that we would want to spare the 'nicer' Brian.
Of course they couldn't kill them both to be sure, the way the machine worked no one knew except this guy, and the other Brians, they were … where were they again? He could conceivably get away with it, Ivan Tow was thinking, and that he should be snuffed out now. The lying prick had killed so many people, permanently for his own selfish, unexplained ends. What the fuck else could happen, why don't I just do it, do it now. Ivan hefted the knife and tightened his grip on it so hard the flesh in his hand went white.
“We need him.” Whispered Ivan Prime to his counterpart, seeing the rage and knowing what he must be thinking. After all he had been through it all in his own head before, when George first arrested him and the realisation that nothing was resetting, that things were not what he was told, hit home. The fear, the guilt and the shame at being fooled and duped so, easily. Willingly. The idea that he wanted to kill underneath all the deceptions, that was the truly fearful part. That would be the thinking that would follow with Ivan Two. “He needs to explain, tell us what the other 'hims' don't know yet.”
Ivan Prime let go of his other self, and then saw the grip loosen a little as the agreement was made to spare him. Ivan Two was not done though, he wanted to tell them apart, and the mixture of the Brians on the floor just upset him as the injured one was starting to come right, the flush leaving his cheeks and his breathing normalising.
“No fucking way.” He growled in gritted teeth and lunged past his other self with the serrated knife in hand, swiping the jagged blade across the cheek of the man on the floor, tearing open a line, a craggy mess of a line that rent the flesh all the way to the thin edge of the cut in his hairline near to his ear.
Brian Prime squealed in agony once more and flopped back on the ground, hitting his head hard on the solid surface. The other Brian leapt backwards, frightened by the speed of the attack and the blood that flicked up from the knife and the wound sprayed on his shirt, leaving a spatter mark that would stay in his memory longer than the stain would be on his clothing.
Ivan Prime stood back and looked into the eyes of his other self, saw the rage and impotence at being unable to deliver what retribution was desired, needed to be meted out. He nodded and then indicated the knife wordlessly. Ivan Two wiped it clean then held it out in one hand while holding the other open for an exchange. They swapped their blades so that Ivan Prime had the jagged, serrated knife and Ivan Two now held the small, sharp one in his right hand. Watching his counterpart steadily and seeing his own self reflected in his eyes he used him as a mirror of sorts and sliced slowly don his own cheek in a vertical line. Much cleaner and not as deep as the open channel he had dug into the arrogant and unfeeling scientific cheek, but deep enough and long enough to leave a decent mark and maybe even a scar.
Ivan Prime went to the kitchen sink and wet two towels, handing one to Brian Two, who with shaking hands pressed it over the still bleeding wound of the marked Brian Prime. The other towel was lobbed across the room to Ivan Two who, still silently, caught the wet cloth one handed and negligently wiped up the blood and covered the cut he had made in his own face with the cold compress.

“No fucking way any of us can hide.” He scanned the room with a fierce glare.