Thought-Drive

When he caught up to Jarvis again, he was back at the bus stop, waiting. David wondered how long the other man had been coming to grips with the things that David was suddenly wrestling with. And even then, how had he. “I spoke of us, but,” Jarvis said, staring straight ahead. “I understand your kind to form groups. Packs.  What I learned from dying is the trouble with moving one finger one inch when not motivated to do so. However speaking is the most difficult part, as if telling secrets long after were the most impossible thing in all of this.” David watched, as Jarvis spoke. His chest was inert. His words did not disturb the air at all. It was almost as if he were moving his lips, and thinking his thoughts loud enough for David to hear. “When one has spent so much energy and focus in existing, to take lives to extend one’s own, everything else going into that becomes less complicated. I have never heard of one such as you, alive, and alone. I suppose your decisions will ...

David thought about the man in the garbage and his fighter of a dog, as the scenery outside transitioned from abandoned businesses and liquor stores to luxury boutiques and grocery stores. The bus took them even further past that, and eventually, when things got too nice, they were back to walking. David was dressed comfortably, but even if he was jogging his attire would not have been confused for workout clothes. Jarvis looked out of place from head to toe. “On your left,” the large man said, but didn’t stop walking. David turned his head to look across the street. He saw the gates of a closed community, thick and iron, but beyond it there were the flashing lights of police cars. “Walter Lancaster,” Jarvis said. “Was a man of great means. He had nothing left to consider in his life but how long it would take for him to die, despite his excess.” David watched the people passing by in their cars watch the two of them. He thought about the friends of his family, and their mea...

When David closed his apartment door behind him, he sighed. He locked it, too, as if maybe turning it would turn back everything that had happened. He was famished, so he ate. He checked his messages while eating as he cooked. He cleaned his teeth and steadied his voice before making the return calls. The story he told was that something had hit him after he left work. Not feeling well, he went right to bed, and woke up the next day, only an hour previous. He was feeling much better now. Truth was the best vehicle for lies. That night, he did not run. The oddest thought occurred to him when he realized that Jarvis knew his address because he had returned his wallet. He thought about the huge man swooping in through one of his windows. And doing what? He had his chance to kill David, and he didn’t. Not like all those men on that roof. Or the two strangers with their green car. David thought about what his father had told him. It probably wasn’t all lies. He probably told his son what...

David didn’t know what to say. He looked down at his body. He knew how to take whatever nick or cut or bruise, and extrapolate what actually happened. He was blue and purple in places, injuries he couldn’t place. He had been cut, and he had been bruised, to the point of bleeding. A wallet flopped in between his legs. “There were nothing else among what remained of your clothes,” the giant said. David’s ears twitched at hearing the voice. It was a deep and hollow sound, like wind blowing through a rotten tree. There was no life to it. He picked up the wallet, and opened it to see his ID card. He still hadn’t gotten around to taking the driving exam. David closed his eyes. “Thank you,” he said. It felt strange, and it felt wrong, but he could not have fathomed what would’ve happened had the police found his wallet so near the murder scene. Murder. His eyes opened again. “Who are you?” he asked. When the man did not answer, he turned and looked. Those same pitiless eyes were boring...

His hearing came back first. There was a booming, a thump, distant vibration, then noise ricocheting in his direction. It was more rhythmic than chaotic though, almost like music. Breathing in, David caught the stench that triggered memory. The rot. He jerked away from the contemplations, feeling sore muscles beneath naked flesh. Wood pricked his skin, and glass, and cold. He creaked his eyes open to see a blurry room with skeletal walls and unevenly spaced floorboards. A gaping hole in the structure cast blinding brightness on his prone form. David tried to move again, and recoiled from the pain. He remembered what would usually follow the disorientation and mystery. People with their hands on him, grabbing and pulling, faceless assailants that always ushered him back to the cage. The pain was much greater this time, and the soreness, to the point that this time, even though he knew they were on their way, he would not try and hide. He had killed all those men, after all. The st...

What he saw was a giant. Since leaving the island, people’s description of David had changed, all reflecting how much smaller he was than the average American male. Several inches shorter, and less broad, the words used decreased him even more. The men in suits were taller than him, with bulging chests and legs beneath their formal wear. The individual they were after was to them as they were to David. He was wearing clothes not too dissimilar from the thugs in the alley, tough looking boots and military pants, a worn leather jacket thrown over a zip up hoodie. All black. Things began to fall apart in David’s mind. Nothing made sense. From his floor level vantage point, the man did not look cornered at all. His posture, even ringed with a dozen pursuers was unaffected. David strained to hear, but the distance was too great. He couldn’t know what they were talking about. He could not imagine someone defying what was so obviously encasement. A cage. Then the wind changed, and what...

There wasn’t just the one man in the suit, looking around like he wasn’t looking around. There were several. They never met up with one another, but they were all encroaching on David’s hiding place. They moved as if directed by a careful and controlling hand. This was it. They thought he would fall on his face, fail because he had been set up for failure, undereducated and underequipped. The miracle of his work at the clinic had forced their hand, and now they were coming to take him back. To put him back in the cage. David thought about his savings account at the bank with the nice people in their offices. It always smelled like jasmine. David thought about a different savings account in a different city with different people in different offices. Every time, for the rest of his life. But he also didn’t want to kill again. “Target location confirmed,” he heard someone say. David’s heckles rose as he sunk down even lower, examined the area around him, an open garage space wi...

All told, the terrier survived the surgery, but his life was irrevocably altered. He didn’t see Summer. The homeless man, presumably his owner, never resurfaced. David went looking but the man had vanished in a mysterious sort of way, a Bay City sort of way. But he had secured a job. Steady, decent work doing something he could convince himself to be invested in on most days. Except for the occasional animal with a particularly bad owner, once he had acclimated to the facility, things went smoothly. The others accepted him for what he was, and behaved when he asked. The murders did not abate. David learned that Bay City had the nation’s highest death rate for homicide killings as well as unsolved missing persons cases. The people weren’t soft, unlike the people on the island, who only sometimes had harder layers deep within themselves. The people of Bay City were guarded, some even predatory, like the hooker in the hotel bar, or the robbers in the alley. The ability to identify onese...

Watching it all happen was like a crazy sort of disaster. David found himself looking ahead, and projecting backwards, trying to piece out what had happened and why. How he could have avoided things. Then there was screeching tires and crumpled metal. David ran into the scene, perceiving the smell of blood and fear, hearing screams and whimpers. A near miss. That’s what they would end up calling it. David found the Jack Russell’s crumpled form shaking from pain. He could see that one of its back legs was broken, and maybe some ribs. “I’m sorry,” David said, on his knees, reaching a hand down to pet the animal’s head. This time he did hear the footsteps approach. A woman in scrubs was sprinting over with a medical bag. David looked up and around, at the wrecked cars. Air bags had deployed. A round man was speaking to a thin woman as she clutched her head. “He’s still alive,” the woman said, crouching near David. “Good, good. Okay. Can you back away please?” David mov...

“I said give me your wallet,” and he held the knife up. David began to reach for his wallet slowly, and froze. “I’m sorry, I can’t do that.” The one with the knife blinked, and glanced at his accomplice. “Look. Shorty. Where do you see this going? We don’t want to hurt you, man.” “It’s all the money I have,” David said. He couldn’t ask for more. Calling home and asking… he couldn’t call home at all. David thought about the last kiss and hug he would ever receive from his mother. “I don’t give a, man get this fool,” the one with the knife said, and stepped forward. David turned and ran. He was facing the wrong end of the alley, but he had to hope there was an outlet. Outrunning the thugs wouldn’t be difficult, but a dead end was still a dead end. Sprinting along, David felt better, like breaking down the fuel in his legs was breaking down the worry in his bones. He needed a job, that was plain, but it didn’t have to be in civil planning. Just so long as he didn’t have to go h...

The next morning he spent on the phone, calling local engineering firms in the city, explaining that he had a dual degree in civil planning and engineering, and was looking for work. Two of the places sounded interested until he explained where his degree was from, and how reputable it was, despite the fact that they had never heard of it. He changed his story to looking for a paid internship. Hunger forced him downstairs, to the hotel bar. A dozen different people were discussing all sorts of things. David ate fish, and eavesdropped. He heard the woman coming, and smelled her before that. “Is this seat taken?” she asked. David turned to see a woman about his age, slim and pretty. How she looked did not match how she smelled at all. Her perfume was pleasant enough, but beneath it, she smelled like one of the dockside hotels. “No,” he said, because it wasn’t. She sat, and they began to talk. The topic of the weather folded into commentary on the city beneath it, which segu...