The One with Ghosts and Zombies: Thursday
Title: The One with Ghosts and Zombies
Author: Lymricks
Rating: PG-13
Genre and/or Pairing: Gen
Spoilers: Nothing episode specific, but definitely a few overall for the whole series if you haven't been paying attention to who's dating/dated who.
Warnings: Billy!Whump, Character sort of death, Zombies, and hijinks.
Word Count: 15,084
Notes: See the master post for notes.
Summary: Billy dies, and somehow Michael's week still gets worse.
Michael is always in control.
That’s important. It’s one of the first thing that Billy explained to Martinez when he was new, it was one of the first things Casey noticed about Michael, and it is what Michael considers his most valuable asset as an agent. Even when he isn’t in control he is. Even when everyone else knows what’s going on and Michael doesn’t, he learns. He likes to think of himself as unstoppable, even though he isn’t, not really. Fake invincibility is no asset, but control-that’s an asset. It’s something he can control. It makes him better.
As he lies on his back that night in the hotel room, Michael thinks about control. It’s a concept that Canaille clearly wants to have a strong grasp of, but also which he clearly doesn’t. The zombies-animated-whatever, those are tragic. They are a crime against every moral in any religion.
Michael had asked all the right questions. He’d wanted to know who the zombies were. They were willing subjects, Canaille said, chosen from a group of people who had made the choice to be experimented on.
He’d asked how much of their old life the zombies remembered. According to Canaille, varying degrees. Some of them cried, or screamed, or whimpered for people Canaille had never heard of. He could only assume they were loved ones.
After witnessing the treatment of the zombies, Michael had wanted to know if they felt. Could they be hurt? Were they sad? Could they feel hunger or thirst?
Canaille had laughed and asked who cared. Michael had almost punched him.
“I care,” he’d wanted to say. “And you should too, because these zombies, they’re people.”
He hadn’t said that though, he’d simply laughed along. Sometimes, small evils have to be committed for the greater good.
The thought makes him uncomfortable and Michael shifts restlessly under the sheets. He rolls onto his back, and then onto his side, and finally onto his stomach. He isn’t soothed or calmed by any of these positions.
“Some of us are trying to sleep, mate,” Billy says, so close to his ear and right next to him. A lesser trained man might have jumped out of his skin, but Michael’s barely-there flinch does nothing to betray his surprise. He’d forgotten about Billy.
But when he rolls over again and squints through the darkness he can clearly see the lumps that make up Billy’s form. His nose is most obvious, framed by the window and the streetlight below. Michael is struck by a childish urge to reach out and flick it.
“Sorry,” he says instead, and he’s surprised by how much he means it.
“It’s fine,” Billy answers. “I mean, sleep is overrated, especially when one has a Zombie Apocalypse to face in the morning.”
Michael laughs and rolls back onto his back. Billy squirms closer and the whole bed shakes, so when Billy’s shoulder presses against Michael’s, it isn’t unexpected. In fact, it’s ordinary and welcome. Michael shuts his eyes for a few seconds and tries to remember the last time something felt ordinary.
There was one day, a day off, in a field in Germany with the sun beating down on his skin, and Faye’s head warm and smelling like flowers on his chest.
That had been so long ago.
“For what its worth, Michael, I’m sorry too.”
He’s said it a million times though, and Michael just wants to roll his eyes and tell him that it doesn’t matter how many times he’s going to say it. Michael knows Billy’s sorry. He knows.
“It’s okay, Billy,” Michael says instead, and the words startle him more than Billy had just a few minutes ago,
Michael sits up quickly and runs his hands through his hair. He feels tired and suddenly old. He laughs as he remembers the way his hands had looked in Amy’s house. He looks down at them, flexing his fingers slowly, but can’t see much in the dark. He is getting old. He knows he is.
But.
Billy is young and alive and Michael’s best friend. It’s been a long time since Michael had even bothered to pretend that he has a best friend. Or maybe it’s been a long time since Michael’s really bothered acknowledging he has one. Either way, one is here and he’s alive.
Michael lets out a tired breath and then he lets it go, he lets all of it go.
Billy tells him stories about Scotland while Michael falls back asleep, because sometimes people don’t want to talk about what’s wrong, they just want to listen.
~ ~ ~
“So let’s go over this one more time,” Michael says, leaning over the table they’ve spread the blue prints and other plans and odds and ends Canaille had given them upon request. As far as evil villains go, he’s not very good at it. Michael’s argued with children who were more capable of securing their tree-houses than this man is of securing his lab.
“Michael,” it’s Martinez, “We got it this time.”
Michael sighs and nods his head. He trusts his team, of course they’ve got it under control. This isn’t just a CIA mission (the thought of the CIA makes him a little nauseous, they don’t know who is coming next) it’s a personal thing. Michael glances at Billy where he’s leaning casually against the wall of the hotel room. With the dorky glasses and white lab coat, Michael almost believes that Billy is exactly who he says he is.
Michael had pointed out the resemblance to a character on one of those British shows Billy was always talking about, but no one else had seen it.
With the assurances in hand, there is nothing else to do but head for the workspace.
~ ~ ~
Their lab is big and white, floor to ceiling stark, colorless wall, complimented only by a lot of stainless steel. The whole thing doesn’t just look scientific, it feels scientific. Michael hates it.
“Well lads,” Billy says genially from the back corner of the room where he’s lounging in the only color in the room-a plain black computer chair. “If the whole returning across the pond doesn’t work out, there’s always this life. Our new boss is more of a clot pole than our old one. He’ll never know.”
“Clot pole?” Amy says, poking her head into the room.
“I think he saw it on Merlin.”
They all turn slowly to look at Martinez, who turns red.
Michael thinks he should be more concerned that Martinez knows so many little things about all of them, but it gives him a luke-warm clumpy feeling (which is sort of the Michael version of a warm and fuzzy feeling).
They go over the plan one more time anyway, because its Michael and he needs this. Once he’s sure that they know it backwards, forwards, and in four different languages, he agrees to let them go. Michael’s been on a thousand missions, been a thousand, anonymous, forgettable guys. This one is different. It isn’t work. It’s personal.
Michael walks down a hallway as light as the lab, his shoes thumping tonelessly against the tiles. It’s time for business and he puts his game face on.
The common area, as it was called on their tour, is full of zombies. His new boss stands in the middle of them all, practicing basic requests. “Turn. Hold. Reach.”
Michael watches them all with the practiced eye of a spy. He treats the world like a filing cabinet. He stores the information, every single detail, for later. In the heat of the moment, Michael never knows what will eventually be useful.
Here and now though, there isn’t much that is.
Michael spends the day being ordinary while his team sets traps. His fingers move over buttons he’s never seen before, but he was premed and he’s smart-so he picks up the patterns quickly. His job makes him sick. His role is to take the bodies of the recently deceased and use the machines to first search them for any metal. Replacement hips, heart devices, gold teeth fillings, anything is fair game. According to Canaille, the team learned early on that the use of any metal in the machine tends to…go wrong.
Canaille didn’t go into specifics about it, but Michael has his suspicions that it has something to do with the screaming, violent tendencies of the…Animated.
Everything about the day is ordinary, it has to be, because the ending-well, that’s what really counts.
There’s a big clock on the wall. It’s ugly and brass. It doesn’t match the décor, what little décor there is, of the place, and Michael spends his whole day staring at it. He’s always hated the phrase about clocks and making them tick, because in all honesty, clocks don’t tick any faster unless you break them-whether someone is watching them or not.
Eventually, though, the ugly brass clock reads five of five in the afternoon. Well, it doesn’t. It reads the British version, but in his head Michael thinks five of five. That’s the one part of CIA training that never really managed to stick.
A minute passes.
Then another.
Then another.
He tightens a white knuckled grip around the edge of the stainless steel table, pressing his button with the other hand. They’d gone over this. Every detail. His team is never late. Then the alarm sounds, loud and blaring, and the whole room is bathed in red. It’s an apt metaphor for the situation. The mission has just gone to Hell.
Training kicks in, though, and self preservation. Someone may have been caught, but not all of them. They’re a team before anything else. They are the ODS and Michael knows that if even one of them is still free, they all stand a chance of walking out of this alive. He’s hearded down a long hallway with a group of other scientists from inside the facility. He feels not unlike the Animated as men in security uniforms bark orders and prod at his back to keep him moving forward.
When they get to the end of the hallway, he knows right away that he isn’t going to like what he sees. The scientists are all standing in a circle around the center of the room. In the middle of them all, looking fat and red in his white lab coat, stands Canaille. The man next to him catches Michael’s attention immediately. Tall and straight shouldered. Michael knows the spiky shape of that hair even through the thick black fabric of the bag secured tightly around the mans head. He knows who he’s going to see when Canaille rips the fabric off.
He sees Billy.
“This man is a traitor to his homeland,” Canaille starts off.
“Aye, mate, but they’ve already deported me for that,” Billy interrupts.
Michael has to hide a smile.
“Whether or not you are officially labeled as a traitor,” Canaille continues, talking over Billy, “I am labeling you as one now.” There’s a long pause that Michael assumes Canaille means to be ominous. It isn’t. Mostly, it’s just awkward, with everyone looking nervously at each other. They’ve clearly never had a security breach before.
Despite the absurdity of Canaille, Michael feels coldness travel slowly up his spine. He may look like Santa, but Canaille could be dangerous. The black bag that had been over Billy’s head proves that. Michael lifts his head and meets Canaille’s gaze, waiting.
“I’ve decided,” Canaille says, “To set an example for all of you. Professor Hart here will become part of the experiment he works so hard at.”
It’s an overdramatic statement. The ODS has only been “working” at the lab for a little over twenty four hours. Billy probably hasn’t even touched a zombie.
“I’ve been looking for someone. I’ve been missing something in my experiment. I needed help.”
Canaille starts a lot of sentences with ‘I.’ Across the circle, Casey tenses. Martinez looks tense too. His team is ready for whatever comes next. Michael feels a hint of pride that he gets to save the world with these men, every day.
“Professor Hart will be the first live human to undergo the process of becoming animated.”
Michael’s stomach drops. Billy just laughs. “Well that’s not so bad, then!” he exclaims. “I’ve already died and come back to life once this week. Why not try it again?”
One of Canaille’s more intimidating guards stands up and backhands Billy. It’s a hard enough hit that Billy drops to the ground, limp and unconscious. Michael’s eyes warn Casey and Martinez to stay put. They need a new plan.
Instead, the ODS watches as the bag goes back over Billy’s head and he is dragged away.
“Shame,” Canaille laughs, “The show will have to wait. The experiment will be much more…enlightening if he is awake. Back to work!”
~ ~ ~
“We need a plan,” Casey says.
Michael doesn’t say anything. He tightens his lips and stares down at his aging hands. Maybe he’s too old for this job now. Maybe if he’d been younger, or smarter, or thought more quickly on his feet…but no. This isn’t the time for those thoughts. There is never a time for those thoughts. This job requires a give and take. Sometimes things get taken. Michael fully intends to steal Billy back, he just has to figure out how.
Martinez is uncharacteristically quiet, standing in the corner near the window. His eyes are locked out on the London streets and h looks pale. “Martinez,” Michael says sharply. He waits several heartbeats, but doesn’t get a response. “Martinez,” he says more gently. “I need your head in the game here.”
“They’re human, you know,” Martinez says.
Michael does know that, but there’s something in the way Martinez says it that stops him from interrupting.
“They aren’t zombies,” Martinez finishes and goes quiet.
That makes sense.
Michael’s heartbeat speeds up. “They’re alive. He’s lying. He isn’t animating the dead, he’s brainwashing the living.”
“It’s a microchip. I was watching them make the chips all day. When the bodies come to you-those people are just in a medical coma, they aren’t dead. The machines are rigged to trick you. Those people are all alive.”
“So why was that woman yelling about silence?” Casey asks.
“The programming in the chip prevents the perception of all sounds that Canaille has deemed unnecessary. Only command tones are understood by the Animated. They are physically incapable of hearing anything else.”
It’s sick, but Michael feels that part of his brain that always knows what’s going on come to life. “So we can save him,” he says. “If we hurry. We just have to-well, we need to move, I’ll explain it on the way.”
~ ~ ~
Martinez isn’t happy. Michael can tell because of the set of his shoulders and the tightness around his eyes. Also, he can tell because Martinez is being particularly vocal about his unhappiness. “I’d do anything for you guys,” he’s saying now, “but this sucks.”
If Billy were here, he’d say that ‘I’d do anything, but…’ worked well for Meatloaf, but Billy isn’t here, and so no one says anything funny. Michael just glares at Martinez’s back and glances around. “Casey,” he says, “how are we doing on time?”
“Three minutes.”
Martinez’s shoulders tense up more and Michael feels a pang of sympathy. The kid is curled up in an awkward position under one of the imposing and ugly steel tables. His hands are above his head, fingers tangled in a set of wires. It’s an uncomfortable job, one that Michael doesn’t envy, but someone has to do it.
Martinez is rewiring the system. They don’t have time to do a total overhaul, but luckily, they don’t need to. Michael watches as his newest team member works, deft and professional, even though he’s being whiny. Michael suspects he isn’t actually whining, but probably just trying to lighten the mood. Its strangely tense without Billy around. The scot brings an energy to even the gravest situations that Michael doesn’t notice when he’s around. The lack thereof, however, is palpable. He can taste the difference in mood.
“Ok, got it.”
Michael nods his head once and the three of them turn to look out the giant observation window. Amy had been conspicuously absent since Billy got caught, but had appeared while they were struggling to figure out a solution without becoming separated. Now it’s her part, and Michael isn’t sure she’ll go through with it.
“Twenty seconds,” Casey says under his breath.
A lot can happen in twenty seconds, but what happens during the time doesn’t count. It’s how everything ends that matters.
“Five, four, three, two…”
Michael swallows hard and says “One.”
It’s their only chance. Amy is their last hope.
Across the pen where the Animated are kept, a low keening sound starts. Slowly, large steel doors open. Michael watches, fascinated, as what he thought were zombies rise slowly to awareness. They straighten up and look around. Young and old, every race, both genders, they are all humans. Michael still cant believe hat someone is doing this to real people. Someone is trying to do it to Billy.
The Animated are loose. Are reanimated. Are people.
“Saving people, helping things,” Casey says next to him. Michael thinks it has something to do with a television show, but he can’t be too sure.
He watches for a second before he turns and nods. “Time to get Billy.”
With the whole station in chaos, it isn’t hard. The corridors are no trickier nor more secure than they were the first day the ODS walked through the doors. Michael knows only one place that would not only secure Billy, but prepare him for the operation. The room with the button that he’d worked in. The one that sucks out all the metal.
Michael has done a lot of running in his career with the CIA. He has never before run quite so fast. Still, it’s a near miss. He kicks down the door just as the machine rumbles to life.
Michael is suddenly thankful he paid attention when they taught him how to work the machine. He punches the button as hard as he can and listens to its death knell, a low sputter and whirl . Billy is pale on the stainless steel, his eyes closed. When Michael reaches out a hand to touch Billy’s neck for a pulse, his skin is almost icy. But underneath Michael’s finger is life.
For the first time since Monday, Michael relaxes.
Author: Lymricks
Rating: PG-13
Genre and/or Pairing: Gen
Spoilers: Nothing episode specific, but definitely a few overall for the whole series if you haven't been paying attention to who's dating/dated who.
Warnings: Billy!Whump, Character sort of death, Zombies, and hijinks.
Word Count: 15,084
Notes: See the master post for notes.
Summary: Billy dies, and somehow Michael's week still gets worse.
Michael is always in control.
That’s important. It’s one of the first thing that Billy explained to Martinez when he was new, it was one of the first things Casey noticed about Michael, and it is what Michael considers his most valuable asset as an agent. Even when he isn’t in control he is. Even when everyone else knows what’s going on and Michael doesn’t, he learns. He likes to think of himself as unstoppable, even though he isn’t, not really. Fake invincibility is no asset, but control-that’s an asset. It’s something he can control. It makes him better.
As he lies on his back that night in the hotel room, Michael thinks about control. It’s a concept that Canaille clearly wants to have a strong grasp of, but also which he clearly doesn’t. The zombies-animated-whatever, those are tragic. They are a crime against every moral in any religion.
Michael had asked all the right questions. He’d wanted to know who the zombies were. They were willing subjects, Canaille said, chosen from a group of people who had made the choice to be experimented on.
He’d asked how much of their old life the zombies remembered. According to Canaille, varying degrees. Some of them cried, or screamed, or whimpered for people Canaille had never heard of. He could only assume they were loved ones.
After witnessing the treatment of the zombies, Michael had wanted to know if they felt. Could they be hurt? Were they sad? Could they feel hunger or thirst?
Canaille had laughed and asked who cared. Michael had almost punched him.
“I care,” he’d wanted to say. “And you should too, because these zombies, they’re people.”
He hadn’t said that though, he’d simply laughed along. Sometimes, small evils have to be committed for the greater good.
The thought makes him uncomfortable and Michael shifts restlessly under the sheets. He rolls onto his back, and then onto his side, and finally onto his stomach. He isn’t soothed or calmed by any of these positions.
“Some of us are trying to sleep, mate,” Billy says, so close to his ear and right next to him. A lesser trained man might have jumped out of his skin, but Michael’s barely-there flinch does nothing to betray his surprise. He’d forgotten about Billy.
But when he rolls over again and squints through the darkness he can clearly see the lumps that make up Billy’s form. His nose is most obvious, framed by the window and the streetlight below. Michael is struck by a childish urge to reach out and flick it.
“Sorry,” he says instead, and he’s surprised by how much he means it.
“It’s fine,” Billy answers. “I mean, sleep is overrated, especially when one has a Zombie Apocalypse to face in the morning.”
Michael laughs and rolls back onto his back. Billy squirms closer and the whole bed shakes, so when Billy’s shoulder presses against Michael’s, it isn’t unexpected. In fact, it’s ordinary and welcome. Michael shuts his eyes for a few seconds and tries to remember the last time something felt ordinary.
There was one day, a day off, in a field in Germany with the sun beating down on his skin, and Faye’s head warm and smelling like flowers on his chest.
That had been so long ago.
“For what its worth, Michael, I’m sorry too.”
He’s said it a million times though, and Michael just wants to roll his eyes and tell him that it doesn’t matter how many times he’s going to say it. Michael knows Billy’s sorry. He knows.
“It’s okay, Billy,” Michael says instead, and the words startle him more than Billy had just a few minutes ago,
Michael sits up quickly and runs his hands through his hair. He feels tired and suddenly old. He laughs as he remembers the way his hands had looked in Amy’s house. He looks down at them, flexing his fingers slowly, but can’t see much in the dark. He is getting old. He knows he is.
But.
Billy is young and alive and Michael’s best friend. It’s been a long time since Michael had even bothered to pretend that he has a best friend. Or maybe it’s been a long time since Michael’s really bothered acknowledging he has one. Either way, one is here and he’s alive.
Michael lets out a tired breath and then he lets it go, he lets all of it go.
Billy tells him stories about Scotland while Michael falls back asleep, because sometimes people don’t want to talk about what’s wrong, they just want to listen.
~ ~ ~
“So let’s go over this one more time,” Michael says, leaning over the table they’ve spread the blue prints and other plans and odds and ends Canaille had given them upon request. As far as evil villains go, he’s not very good at it. Michael’s argued with children who were more capable of securing their tree-houses than this man is of securing his lab.
“Michael,” it’s Martinez, “We got it this time.”
Michael sighs and nods his head. He trusts his team, of course they’ve got it under control. This isn’t just a CIA mission (the thought of the CIA makes him a little nauseous, they don’t know who is coming next) it’s a personal thing. Michael glances at Billy where he’s leaning casually against the wall of the hotel room. With the dorky glasses and white lab coat, Michael almost believes that Billy is exactly who he says he is.
Michael had pointed out the resemblance to a character on one of those British shows Billy was always talking about, but no one else had seen it.
With the assurances in hand, there is nothing else to do but head for the workspace.
~ ~ ~
Their lab is big and white, floor to ceiling stark, colorless wall, complimented only by a lot of stainless steel. The whole thing doesn’t just look scientific, it feels scientific. Michael hates it.
“Well lads,” Billy says genially from the back corner of the room where he’s lounging in the only color in the room-a plain black computer chair. “If the whole returning across the pond doesn’t work out, there’s always this life. Our new boss is more of a clot pole than our old one. He’ll never know.”
“Clot pole?” Amy says, poking her head into the room.
“I think he saw it on Merlin.”
They all turn slowly to look at Martinez, who turns red.
Michael thinks he should be more concerned that Martinez knows so many little things about all of them, but it gives him a luke-warm clumpy feeling (which is sort of the Michael version of a warm and fuzzy feeling).
They go over the plan one more time anyway, because its Michael and he needs this. Once he’s sure that they know it backwards, forwards, and in four different languages, he agrees to let them go. Michael’s been on a thousand missions, been a thousand, anonymous, forgettable guys. This one is different. It isn’t work. It’s personal.
Michael walks down a hallway as light as the lab, his shoes thumping tonelessly against the tiles. It’s time for business and he puts his game face on.
The common area, as it was called on their tour, is full of zombies. His new boss stands in the middle of them all, practicing basic requests. “Turn. Hold. Reach.”
Michael watches them all with the practiced eye of a spy. He treats the world like a filing cabinet. He stores the information, every single detail, for later. In the heat of the moment, Michael never knows what will eventually be useful.
Here and now though, there isn’t much that is.
Michael spends the day being ordinary while his team sets traps. His fingers move over buttons he’s never seen before, but he was premed and he’s smart-so he picks up the patterns quickly. His job makes him sick. His role is to take the bodies of the recently deceased and use the machines to first search them for any metal. Replacement hips, heart devices, gold teeth fillings, anything is fair game. According to Canaille, the team learned early on that the use of any metal in the machine tends to…go wrong.
Canaille didn’t go into specifics about it, but Michael has his suspicions that it has something to do with the screaming, violent tendencies of the…Animated.
Everything about the day is ordinary, it has to be, because the ending-well, that’s what really counts.
There’s a big clock on the wall. It’s ugly and brass. It doesn’t match the décor, what little décor there is, of the place, and Michael spends his whole day staring at it. He’s always hated the phrase about clocks and making them tick, because in all honesty, clocks don’t tick any faster unless you break them-whether someone is watching them or not.
Eventually, though, the ugly brass clock reads five of five in the afternoon. Well, it doesn’t. It reads the British version, but in his head Michael thinks five of five. That’s the one part of CIA training that never really managed to stick.
A minute passes.
Then another.
Then another.
He tightens a white knuckled grip around the edge of the stainless steel table, pressing his button with the other hand. They’d gone over this. Every detail. His team is never late. Then the alarm sounds, loud and blaring, and the whole room is bathed in red. It’s an apt metaphor for the situation. The mission has just gone to Hell.
Training kicks in, though, and self preservation. Someone may have been caught, but not all of them. They’re a team before anything else. They are the ODS and Michael knows that if even one of them is still free, they all stand a chance of walking out of this alive. He’s hearded down a long hallway with a group of other scientists from inside the facility. He feels not unlike the Animated as men in security uniforms bark orders and prod at his back to keep him moving forward.
When they get to the end of the hallway, he knows right away that he isn’t going to like what he sees. The scientists are all standing in a circle around the center of the room. In the middle of them all, looking fat and red in his white lab coat, stands Canaille. The man next to him catches Michael’s attention immediately. Tall and straight shouldered. Michael knows the spiky shape of that hair even through the thick black fabric of the bag secured tightly around the mans head. He knows who he’s going to see when Canaille rips the fabric off.
He sees Billy.
“This man is a traitor to his homeland,” Canaille starts off.
“Aye, mate, but they’ve already deported me for that,” Billy interrupts.
Michael has to hide a smile.
“Whether or not you are officially labeled as a traitor,” Canaille continues, talking over Billy, “I am labeling you as one now.” There’s a long pause that Michael assumes Canaille means to be ominous. It isn’t. Mostly, it’s just awkward, with everyone looking nervously at each other. They’ve clearly never had a security breach before.
Despite the absurdity of Canaille, Michael feels coldness travel slowly up his spine. He may look like Santa, but Canaille could be dangerous. The black bag that had been over Billy’s head proves that. Michael lifts his head and meets Canaille’s gaze, waiting.
“I’ve decided,” Canaille says, “To set an example for all of you. Professor Hart here will become part of the experiment he works so hard at.”
It’s an overdramatic statement. The ODS has only been “working” at the lab for a little over twenty four hours. Billy probably hasn’t even touched a zombie.
“I’ve been looking for someone. I’ve been missing something in my experiment. I needed help.”
Canaille starts a lot of sentences with ‘I.’ Across the circle, Casey tenses. Martinez looks tense too. His team is ready for whatever comes next. Michael feels a hint of pride that he gets to save the world with these men, every day.
“Professor Hart will be the first live human to undergo the process of becoming animated.”
Michael’s stomach drops. Billy just laughs. “Well that’s not so bad, then!” he exclaims. “I’ve already died and come back to life once this week. Why not try it again?”
One of Canaille’s more intimidating guards stands up and backhands Billy. It’s a hard enough hit that Billy drops to the ground, limp and unconscious. Michael’s eyes warn Casey and Martinez to stay put. They need a new plan.
Instead, the ODS watches as the bag goes back over Billy’s head and he is dragged away.
“Shame,” Canaille laughs, “The show will have to wait. The experiment will be much more…enlightening if he is awake. Back to work!”
~ ~ ~
“We need a plan,” Casey says.
Michael doesn’t say anything. He tightens his lips and stares down at his aging hands. Maybe he’s too old for this job now. Maybe if he’d been younger, or smarter, or thought more quickly on his feet…but no. This isn’t the time for those thoughts. There is never a time for those thoughts. This job requires a give and take. Sometimes things get taken. Michael fully intends to steal Billy back, he just has to figure out how.
Martinez is uncharacteristically quiet, standing in the corner near the window. His eyes are locked out on the London streets and h looks pale. “Martinez,” Michael says sharply. He waits several heartbeats, but doesn’t get a response. “Martinez,” he says more gently. “I need your head in the game here.”
“They’re human, you know,” Martinez says.
Michael does know that, but there’s something in the way Martinez says it that stops him from interrupting.
“They aren’t zombies,” Martinez finishes and goes quiet.
That makes sense.
Michael’s heartbeat speeds up. “They’re alive. He’s lying. He isn’t animating the dead, he’s brainwashing the living.”
“It’s a microchip. I was watching them make the chips all day. When the bodies come to you-those people are just in a medical coma, they aren’t dead. The machines are rigged to trick you. Those people are all alive.”
“So why was that woman yelling about silence?” Casey asks.
“The programming in the chip prevents the perception of all sounds that Canaille has deemed unnecessary. Only command tones are understood by the Animated. They are physically incapable of hearing anything else.”
It’s sick, but Michael feels that part of his brain that always knows what’s going on come to life. “So we can save him,” he says. “If we hurry. We just have to-well, we need to move, I’ll explain it on the way.”
~ ~ ~
Martinez isn’t happy. Michael can tell because of the set of his shoulders and the tightness around his eyes. Also, he can tell because Martinez is being particularly vocal about his unhappiness. “I’d do anything for you guys,” he’s saying now, “but this sucks.”
If Billy were here, he’d say that ‘I’d do anything, but…’ worked well for Meatloaf, but Billy isn’t here, and so no one says anything funny. Michael just glares at Martinez’s back and glances around. “Casey,” he says, “how are we doing on time?”
“Three minutes.”
Martinez’s shoulders tense up more and Michael feels a pang of sympathy. The kid is curled up in an awkward position under one of the imposing and ugly steel tables. His hands are above his head, fingers tangled in a set of wires. It’s an uncomfortable job, one that Michael doesn’t envy, but someone has to do it.
Martinez is rewiring the system. They don’t have time to do a total overhaul, but luckily, they don’t need to. Michael watches as his newest team member works, deft and professional, even though he’s being whiny. Michael suspects he isn’t actually whining, but probably just trying to lighten the mood. Its strangely tense without Billy around. The scot brings an energy to even the gravest situations that Michael doesn’t notice when he’s around. The lack thereof, however, is palpable. He can taste the difference in mood.
“Ok, got it.”
Michael nods his head once and the three of them turn to look out the giant observation window. Amy had been conspicuously absent since Billy got caught, but had appeared while they were struggling to figure out a solution without becoming separated. Now it’s her part, and Michael isn’t sure she’ll go through with it.
“Twenty seconds,” Casey says under his breath.
A lot can happen in twenty seconds, but what happens during the time doesn’t count. It’s how everything ends that matters.
“Five, four, three, two…”
Michael swallows hard and says “One.”
It’s their only chance. Amy is their last hope.
Across the pen where the Animated are kept, a low keening sound starts. Slowly, large steel doors open. Michael watches, fascinated, as what he thought were zombies rise slowly to awareness. They straighten up and look around. Young and old, every race, both genders, they are all humans. Michael still cant believe hat someone is doing this to real people. Someone is trying to do it to Billy.
The Animated are loose. Are reanimated. Are people.
“Saving people, helping things,” Casey says next to him. Michael thinks it has something to do with a television show, but he can’t be too sure.
He watches for a second before he turns and nods. “Time to get Billy.”
With the whole station in chaos, it isn’t hard. The corridors are no trickier nor more secure than they were the first day the ODS walked through the doors. Michael knows only one place that would not only secure Billy, but prepare him for the operation. The room with the button that he’d worked in. The one that sucks out all the metal.
Michael has done a lot of running in his career with the CIA. He has never before run quite so fast. Still, it’s a near miss. He kicks down the door just as the machine rumbles to life.
Michael is suddenly thankful he paid attention when they taught him how to work the machine. He punches the button as hard as he can and listens to its death knell, a low sputter and whirl . Billy is pale on the stainless steel, his eyes closed. When Michael reaches out a hand to touch Billy’s neck for a pulse, his skin is almost icy. But underneath Michael’s finger is life.
For the first time since Monday, Michael relaxes.