> Debashis in Plureality 5

bright. sunny day. puffy clouds. warm wispy breeze.
grainy filmy image.


commotion. just over there. pan out. turn to the commotion. focus in, too far in, blurry and focus out. see more clearly. 


he’s being pulled. three others. are pulling him.
words and shouts, nothing really intelligible.
Chaos. Loud. Emergency. Urgent. Disorder. 


imperative to Intervene. but no manuals. no rules. no protocol.
just observe? 


he’s not resisting the others. can’t.


Heart.Beats.Faster. 


he is losing strength. dragged to the street.
they are intervening. violently. they are intervening.
he’s weak. grainy scene. sunny sky in sepia tones? moving toward black and white and grey. 


they’re pounding on him. on his chest. some kind of system re-boot?????? 


getting darker and scene fading. they’re still pounding on him. no energy left. his eyes are trying to stay open and he stares at everything and anything. scene keeps fading. they’re still shouting and yelling. scene fades and pans out. 


no-manuals-no-rules-no-protocol 


can only observe. can’t intervene. 


fade to white. heart beats loud.

Black Magick

It was a little past three in the morning; Max was wide awake. He lay in bed with Mags snuggled against him and stared through the french doors at the silhouetted cityscape, his mind throwing images like a turning slot wheel machine. Max eased out of bed, pulled on his jeans, and quietly stepped outside into the morning air. 

He stood on the balcony overlooking the city below, absently surveying the landscape like a deposed king. The images continued to dance in his mind, and he couldn't make any sense of them. There was no discernible pattern.

"Are you okay?"

"No," he honestly answered. He turned to face Mags, who was leaning up against the door. "I really could use a coffee though."

Mags flowed over and embraced him. She gave him a kiss and then said, "Sounds like a plan to me."

The Thought That Counts

Moving right along at a rapid pace, the group didn't pause for a second. There was no time to lose, as the saying goes. For if they faltered for just a moment, the hordes of flesh-eating alien cyborgnetic-organisms would slightly gain the advantage.

Frank dropped back from his pace with Max and joined in with Angst who was with Tatter, Suki and Aqua. They were keeping each others' pace.

"I don't know if this is the proper time or place for this," Frank said as he reached inside his jacket. "I just wanted to give you something, and I don't know if we are going to get out of this one alive. So I have to do this now."

He handed Angst a small parcel adding, "Merry Christmas."

Starlight Tango

Max sat on the rock watching the horizon as the sun set. Twilight time. He was looking for the first star he could see. He waited with an unlit cigarette between his fingers, it was ready for sentry duty.

He heard faint music coming from Angst's mp3 player, she was listening to some mash-up tune. She was lying on the hood of the car with her eyes closed, listening.

His cellphone chimed and he answered.

"Yo," he said.

"Max," Suki chimed in. "Do you see her yet?"

"Keeping my eye open," he replied.

"Should be any second now."

And as if on cue Max spotted the twinkle in the sky. "There she is," he replied and he tapped Angst on the shoulder. She straightened up.

"Time to tango," Angst said. She looked up to where Max pointed and smiled. She slid off the hood and put the player into the car.

"We only got one shot at this, kiddo," Max said. "Let's not screw this one up."

What Series IS This Anyway?

On the morning train Max blended in with the other commuters who were heading off to work. There were over two dozen commuters in the car and Max didn't mind it at all, since Bishop seemed to have something in the works. It was rare to find this many people in the car. 

Even though his eyes were closed and he looked like he was dozing off, Max's mind was going over a number of future unwritten scenarios that might occur. He was interrupted from his morning process when someone plopped into the chair next to him.

"Is this seat taken?" the fellow asked. 

Max shook his head and straightened himself up; he glanced out the window.

"Do you mind if I asked you something?" the commuter inquired after several moments of silence. 

"Fire away," Max told him.

"I was told that if I needed something done that I was to find a certain person that rides a certain subway car and he might help me with my problem," the commuter said in a low secretive voice.

"Well," Max said as he leaned over to the man. "It all depends on who you where you looking for. But, by the sounds of it you are looking for a fictional character called Hannibal Smith."

+ PLEX TOURS .1 The Lab

• The Bunker
• The Lab Level Two
• The Cast
• The Bookstore
• The Brownstone
• The Subway
• Metafesto
• The Diner
• Chronoplex

Suki lowered her voice as they stepped from the hallway into the room. “This is the Lab.” 

Tatterdemalion shivered; it was cold in the room, or creepy, or both. The banks of machines, tubes arcing and twisting in the corners, the sounds of chemicals and calculations. Sterile smells. Her brow furrowed.

Suki noticed. “It’s familiar to you because this is where your Plex-unit was implanted. The memory won’t be conscious, of course.” 

Tatter suddenly felt ridiculous. Standing in this super-sci-fi hi-tech room in her baggy sweater, listening to a uniformed schoolgirl with a massive handgun perched on her hip tell her about brainwashing and psychological modifications.

Angst put her hand on Tatter’s shoulder. “Breathe. Do your visualizations.” 

Tatter jumped a bit at the touch of the cheerleader, but did as she said, and felt a little calmer.

Angst slipped her arm through Tatter’s, gave a comforting squeeze. “That feeling of absurdity, the doubt about the reality of what’s happening to you… That’s residue from the equipment.” 

Suki was watching some of the screens flash arcane equations. “Morganfokker’s tech emits fields that destabilize the mind’s sense of ontological certainty.” She smirked. “That’s how the Professor describes it anyway.”

Tatter shivered again. “So who’s this Morganfokker?” 

Angst led her over to one of the machines. A steel frame housing hundreds of slender glass vials, threads of light weaving across their surfaces. “We’re not exactly sure. He’s like Max and Maggie.” 

“In what way?” Tatter asked. 

Suki answered. “Well, you know how the Dragons have what the Prof calls 'Continuity'? I’m me, Frank’s Frank, Goner’s-“ 

“-a spaz,” Angst interjected, and the three girls shared a giggle. 

“But Maggie and most of all Max can be, like, all sorts of people? How they change during shifts, not just the place?”

Tatter sighed. “I’m not sure I follow…” She was remembering the day that she was abducted from her homeworld… but staticky flashes of another scene kept interrupting. Her parents dropping her off at University… Meeting her dorm-mate Maggie, talking about role-playing games… 

Angst scanned the vials. Her eyes looked sad. “In one of these I had a baby….”

Suki looked at Tatter with a serious expression. “He can give you things, and he can take them away. He can make you dream, and he can wake you up.” 

Suddenly all the screens in the Lab flickered. Flashed. The machines started to hum and thrum and whine. 

“What’s happening?” Tatter shouted. 

“We shouldn’t have come here,” Angst said, echoes of tears in her eyes.

Suki was staring at the strange, swirling patterns that were storming across the monitors. “I see… It’s Max… He needs our help.”

A Grinding Halt

The train came to a sudden stop, catching all the occupants off guard and sending them stumbling about. Max's head rammed off a metal pole, knocking him for a loop. Maggie maintained her balance as well as Wraith, but the others were scattered on the floor of the car.

"What happened?" Goner questioned. He was picking himself up and felt his temple. He was bleeding.

"We've stopped," Suki replied.

"No guff," Goner shot back.

The car was in total darkness, then the emergency lighting kicked on giving the area an unholy glow.

"This doesn't look good," Frank said.

"It's just that tip of the iceberg," Mags whispered.

Buried in the City Section...

Suki looked as Max sat down and slid a newspaper in front of her. The paper was folded to a certain page that made her look. Her eyes widened in shock as she saw herself looking back at her.

Her school photo looked up at her from the page. This time it wasn't just a Missing poster plastered on the bulletin board inside the foyer of a department store. Here it was in black and white and distributed amongst the city.

Missing.

The feeling hit her hard and she was indeed shocked to see it. She didn't feel like crying, but a wave of nostalgia washed over her like a hurricane approaching shore.

Mags folded the paper over so the photo was hidden. With the slight hum of the air conditioner, it seemed it was the only noise in the diner for several long seconds.

"What do you want to do?" Max asked Suki.

"Nothing," Suki replied. "That's another lifetime ago."

Say Goodbye, Major MoFo

Max poured on the speed; he heard someone hit the ground behind him. One of his pursuers had gotten his feet tangled up and mother nature brought him down. 

He ran until he felt a stitch in his side, and that's when he stopped. Max jumped over a fallen log and rolled close to it for cover.

He only had a few moments to wait until three men hurdled past. Max waited momentarily, waiting for his breath to catch up to him before deciding what next to do. 

"Where'd he go?" he heard one man shout.

"He's around here someplace," another replied. "Fan out." 

Max knew his options weren't too good and he was calculating his odds of success, when his eyes spotted something on the ground.

It was green and round. A grenade. One of the men had lost it when they hurdled the fallen log. Max smiled.

Eat This!

An automatic fired, the bullets chewing away at the concret slab. It seemed that the concrete might outlast them. 

"Don't let them get to Tatter," Max said.

Mags looked at her wound; she didn't need a doctor to tell her that it was pretty bad. 

"Well," she said as she finished wrapping a makeshift bandage around her torso, "We're between the proverbial rock and a hard place."

"It seems to be that way a lot, hasn't it?" Max joked. He shot Mags a wink. "I guess it's always better than the alternative of not doing a thing about it."

The Vinyl Effect

The ticking of the clock made him nervous, each tick seemed to be harping away at him telling his senses what his brain failed to acknowledged.

His cellphone rested on his lap as he puffed away at another cigarette; it was his fourth in a row and this one was down to near the filter. He was thinking of lighting up another one when his cellphone came alive.

"Yes," he said as he brought it up to his ear.

"We're in some serious shit," the voice on the other end told him. "We need Pretty and we need him bad."

"I will find him," he replied. "Is there anything in particular you need him to get?"

"Vinyl," the voice on the other end said.

"Vinyl?" he repeated the word.

"Pretty knows what it's all about," the voice said.

The Egress Action

"It's raining," Frank said. "Damn, why does it have to be rain today."

"Maybe mother nature is at war?" Goner replied. He had his gun sitting on the dash as if it were a coffee cup cooling down. He was getting tired from all this waiting.

"You might have a point there," Frank noted. He rolled down the window and threw out the butt of a cigarette. Then rolled it back up again.

"So, all we have to do is wait for the signal?" Goner asked.

"Anytime soon," Frank answered after checking his watch. "He's running a little behind schedule."

They heard the sound of glass breaking and looked to see that Max had vacated the building through the easiest egress he could find. He was firing blindly behind him as well.

"That's our cue," Frank said as he switched from neutral to drive.

The Sound of Bullets Dancing

Bullet casings fell to the cement floor making metallic notes to the ears. A symphony of metal, sweet to some but sour to others. The conductor of this particular song was sweating and tired, but he kept the music going.

Max kept pulling the trigger on the guns until the last bullet left. Then he ducked down to reload. He glanced over at Mags who had torn a strip of her shirt.

"No matter how many fall there seems to be two more that spring up," he told her.

"Crap," Mags said. She was bandaging up Frank's leg.

"Well," Frank said. "Talk about being between a rock and a hard place."

"You giving up already?" Mags asked him with a wink.

"If you guys want to chat on your own time that's fine by me," Max said after sliding the reload clip into one of his guns. "But there's another pressing matter going on here."