User:Posti/Jacked into the System
Jacked in the System
Jake flexed in front of the mirror and grinned. The brand-name snobs who paid five-figure price tags for a BodMod suit would choke if they knew how much money they were wasting. This back-alley knock-off had turned his pale, dumpy body into a chiseled masterpiece – at less than a quarter the cost. And this was a total package suit, not one of the basic models.
He gave his reflection a last look. It still wasn’t too late to slip on the BodMod’s facial overlay and make a few changes. That was the only option he hadn’t used, and he hated to waste it. The moment he turned the suit off, the nanobots that had been restructuring him for the past month would lock. Not that he didn’t look a lot different even with his old features. He’d used the special contacts to change his eye color, and straightened and whitened his teeth. Even so, he was still recognizable to anyone who knew him. Yeah, this was what he wanted.
Wiping his hand off on a towel, he reached back and felt for the nearly invisible depression at the base of his spine. The designers had made sure you couldn’t accidentally shut things down – it took a conscious effort to press his thumb into the ID sensor. He heard the soft tone that signaled acceptance. In a minute or two the thin membrane that formed the suit’s outmost layer would separate like a snake skin, and this four-week transformation would be over.
Except that the membrane did not split. Jake frowned as a sensation of heat built up in his skin, and spread slowly inward. He’d felt the same thing when he first put the BodMod on – according to the user’s guide, that indicated that the nanobots were starting up. Concerned, he went into the living room and dug out the photocopied pages. The paragraph on removal only listed pressing the ID sensor.
Maybe he hadn’t quite positioned his thumb properly. Jake reached back again, really having to strain to touch the sensor this time. It buzzed, indicating an invalid ID. Repositioning his hand didn’t help, and on the fourth try, he found he couldn’t reach the base of his spine any more. Bewildered, he tried stretching out his arms, and discovered they were both covered in hair!
What the Hell? He had specified smooth skin! What was going on? Then he gasped as pain shot up his back and exploded into a horrible migraine. Clutching his temples, he staggered back to sit on the sofa, breathing hard. Something was wrong with the suit! Oh, shit! He’d heard of BodMods that malfunctioned, but always in the early stages. He’d just turned the damned thing off!
What had started as moderately pleasant warmth increased suddenly into searing heat. Jake forced himself up and staggered for the vidphone. His hands and feet were cramping, and vision blurred so badly he could barely make out the unit on the desk. This shouldn’t be happening! There were a hundred safety protocols built into these things.
He reached the desk, and had to struggle to get words from his burning throat.. “Emergency Services!”
The voice-activated monitor lit up and the familiar, disembodied voice of its AI spoke. “Please state the nature of your emergency. Medical, Police, Fire, or Other.”
“Muhcluh.” Jake shook his head and tried again. “Meheeehuuuuu.”
“I’m sorry. I did not understand your request. Please repeat.”
Shit! His tongue was swelling up, distorting an already garbled voice. “Meeeehhhheeeehlllllaaaaaw.” Tried to speak slowly didn’t help.
“I’m sorry. Your vocal pattern and request cannot be recognized by this unit. Please use thumb print or retinal scanner to verify identification, or enter service request manually using the input located at the base of the monitor.”
Jake swung his head, trying to make out the blurred symbols, and struggled to press his thumb into the vidphone’s ID sensor. The unit buzzed. “I’m sorry. Please have the registered owner of the vidphone authorize use.”
Dammit! He –was- the registered owner! Two more tries resulted in the same message, and he finally gave up and jabbed at the retinal scan button. A beam of light shot from the monitor and moved across his face, finally locating his right eye. It flashed and went out. “I’m sorry. Please have the registered owner of the vidphone authorize use.”
Screaming in frustration, Jake stumbled for the door. His blood had turned to molten lava, and muscles were cramping so badly that he ended up falling sideways before he was halfway across the room. Unable to get up, he writhed in agony until his mind could take no more, and he fell into blissful oblivion.
“…verified. Thank you, Mr. Bradner. Your travel arrangements are complete. Will you be requiring a rental car in Australia?”
Jake struggled awake, confused by the muffled female voice. It had the slightly tinny sound of a vidphone. Australia? He wasn’t going to Australia!
“No. I’ve chartered a tour of the Outback. Hiking for more than a month.”
Who was that? A man’s voice, oddly familiar. He opened his eyes, but the room was dark. There was an uncomfortable pressure around his wrists and ankles, and he found he couldn’t move them at all. After pulling a few times, he realized he had been tied up with some of thick, soft rope.
“Lucky you!” The woman sounded cheerful. “You can pick up your e-ticket when you go to the airport on Friday. And thank you for choosing Quantas.!” An electronic tone indicated the end of the call.
“Shit!” A young woman, maybe a teenager, shouted. “Why’d you have to choose fucking Australia? This loser ain’t got shit! By the time they take out for the ticket, he won’t have ten thousand in the bank!”
“Chill, Denise.” That familiar voice again. “This is all part of the plan, remember?”
“Fuck the plan! Why can’t he ‘lose himself’ in Ohio?”
“Because a trip to Australia means a lot of expenses can be charged to his account without raising a flag. We can max his credit for clothes, computers, and spending money. Lots of spending money. There aren’t any ATMs in the Outback. Or phones. And il be a month before anyone starts to miss him.”
“Yeah, well, what do we do with him? That freak sure ain’t part of the plan!” There was a loud thud near Jake’s head. He must be in the closet, and the girl had hit or kicked the door.
“I told you, I’ll fix that.”
With a start of shock, Jake suddenly recognized the tense male voice as his own. But how? He’d heard synthesized voices before – they had a tinny sound that couldn’t be masked. And no matter how good the impersonator was, an individual’s vocal pattern was supposed to be as unique as a fingerprint. That was the whole basis of vocal ID.
“Fix what?!” Denise was obviously not the calm type. “You said he’d be a donkey! A happy little animal to be dropped off at the petting zoo. Maybe I ain’t no expert on the subject, but I don’t think too many donkeys have fucking human faces!”
What was she talking about? Who was a donkey? It occurred to Jake that his hands and feet felt odd, and his arms were a little stiff. No! It wasn’t possible. BodMods couldn’t change species! Alarmed, he tried to flex his fingers, but felt nothing move. And when he tried to reach up, his elbows wouldn’t bend properly. They would, however, bend backwards.
His scream came out as a strangled braying sound, surprisingly loud in his ears, and he thrashed frantically to free himself. Light blinded him as the closet door was jerked open.
“Shut up! Shut up, freak!” A girl he assumed was Denise gave him a brutal kick in the side, and then grabbed one of his legs. Someone else took hold of the other, and he was dragged out into the middle of the living room. Gasping for breath, he started to scream again. Only to fall silent when a nasty-looking switchblade popped open in front of his face. “You wanna be a dead freak? Make one more sound!”
Even bewildered and terrified, Jake knew enough to stop struggling. He was pinned by a shaggy-looking Hispanic boy who couldn’t be more than 18. Denise looked to be about the same age, but had pale skin and enough body piercings to set off a metal detector a mile away. Twisting his head towards the middle of the room, Jake saw a black girl in jeans and a T-shirt sitting in front of his computer. Damn! They had trashed the place! Drawers hung open, sofa cushions were on the floor, even the pictures were off the walls.
A fourth figure was standing close, and squatted down to grin into his face. “Well, hello there. My name is Jake Bradner. What’s yours?”
Jake stared up at the features he had just been admiring in the mirror. In truth, the imposter’s face looked a little younger, but there wasn’t enough difference for anyone to notice – and if they did, they’d naturally assume it was all part of the BodMod.
“You didn’t use the facial overlay.” The imposter waggled a finger. “Bad donkey! That wasn’t part of the plan. Now Denise is all upset, and it’s a very bad idea to make Denise upset.” He leaned closer. “Where did you put it? The overlay? Tell me, and things will go a lot easier on you.”
Why did they want the overlay? It was useless now. Clearing his throat, Jake tried to ask what this was all about. The sounds that emerged from his lips were little more than grunts and wheezes that sounded much like the brays of a jackass.
“Damn.” The imposter shook his head. “I was afraid of that. Well, we’ll have to search it out. I’m sure anybody who folds his socks and underwear so neatly doesn’t throw part of an expensive BodMod suit away.”
“Rodger!” The black girl called from the computer. “I have his message service up – you need to thumbprint the screen for me.”
“Just a minute.” The imposter pursed his lips and then exhaled. “OK. Here’s the deal. If you want to keep breathing, stay quiet and cooperate. Cause trouble and Denise will give you a scarlet smile.” He ran a finger across his throat.
Forcing back numbing terror and confusion, Jake managed to nod once. There was no doubt at all in his mind that the scowling bitch with pierced everything would happily open his jugular.
Apparently satisfied, the imposter stood and walked over to the computer. A moment later, Jake heard the cheerful ‘You’ve Got Mail’ that meant they had accessed his email account. The imposter had managed to duplicate both his voice and his thumbprint closely enough to fool ID sensors – something that supposedly could not be done. It had to be some new kind of BodMod variation – except, where had they gotten his ID patterns to duplicate?
The Hispanic youth sat up and brushed himself off, wrinkling his nose in distaste. “He stinks like a donkey. If he shits like one, I ain’t cleaning it up.”
“Look, Rodg.” The black girl was whispering to the imposter so loudly that Jake could make it out clearly. “I didn’t sign up for murder. You promised nobody would get hurt.”
“He won’t be hurt, as long as he isn’t stupid.” Rodger glanced back in Jake’s direction and scowled, then lowered his voice so that it was barely perceptible. “It’s too late to back out now. Identity theft is automatic twenty years, Rachel. And we’ve turned him into an animal – that could be considered murder. It’s an easy choice for me. What about you?”
The imposter looked back in Jake’s direction, and jerked his head towards the bedroom. “Drag him in there. Leave him tied up, but put a bowl of water where he can get to it. And check the fridge for anything he can eat. Lettuce, carrots, apples. No meat. Bread should be OK.”
“Why?” Denise seemed put out that she couldn’t use her knife. “Let the freak go hungry.”
Roger took two quick steps and yanked her up off the floor by her hair. “Because I said so!” Then he threw her forward hard enough that she sprawled on the floor. Scrambling up, Denise spun and held the knife up, face contorted with rage. Rodger regarded her with a cool gaze that was somehow even more dangerous than the girl’s anger. “You need me. Very badly. I, on the other hand, can do quite nicely without you. Remember that.” And then he turned his back on her and the switchblade and went back to look at the computer screen.
For a moment, Jake was afraid that whatever the imposter had on this psycho wouldn’t be enough. However, she finally put the weapon away and helped the Hispanic boy drag him into the bedroom. At least her anger had been redirected, for she didn’t abuse him any more. The Hispanic kid brought a plastic bowl of water and the bag of baby carrots that had been lying in the bottom of the refrigerator for a month. After dumping them out where he could reach them with his mouth, the kid and the psycho left, pulling the door shut.
Jake lay there several minutes before he thought to look at himself. With all the screaming and kicking and knives flashing, he’d had other things to worry about. Now he found that he was afraid to see what had been done to him. Finally, he took a breath and twisted his head around.
Donkey. That’s what they’d called him, and with good reason. As far as he could tell, everything from the neck down was pure jackass. He had forelegs instead of arms, with small, gray-brown hooves replacing hands and feet. His body had barreled out, and looked a little thick for the legs. The proportions were not as aesthetic as a horse’s, but matched the few pictures of asses he could remember seeing.
His sexual equipment was coal black and enormous, though it probably was normal for a donkey. And to think he’d been a little self-conscious about the modifications he’d made to his human parts. Trussed up as he was, it was difficult to make out much of his rump. Moving his ropey tail was oddly fascinating, perhaps because it was a totally new appendage. The same could be said for his ears, which stretched out on either side of his head and seemed to move on their own volition.
Everything had changed except for his face. Jake felt a slight chill. If he hadn’t opted to leave his features unaltered, he’d be indistinguishable from a normal animal. However, at this point, he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. He had no hands, no voice. In essence, he was a crippled freak of nature – no, a freak of technology. That distinction was all that allowed him to maintain a tenuous grip on sanity. There was still a chance that that same technology could be used to make him human again.
He let his head drop back to the floor and stared at the wall. BodMods weren’t supposed to be able to do stuff like this. Even the most expensive versions were limited to basic human structure, though some European companies offered sex and age changes that had been banned here. Still, there was a Hell of a big difference between turning into a girl and growing hooves and a tail!
The BodMod must have had some kind of secondary programming that activated when he tried to take it off. It also had to have sent Jake’s core pattern from the suit’s identity buffer. Something else that was supposedly impossible. However, that was the only way the imposter could have all three of Jake’s ID sources accurate enough to fool corporate and personal sensors, as well as the changes he’d programmed into the BodMod himself. Someone had gone to tremendous expense and trouble to steal his identity. The biggest question was – why?
His job at Portal Corporation certainly offered no incentive. While the software giant was one of the largest private companies in the world, Jake was just one of the faceless masses that sat in a cubicle every day. He had no access to classified information, finances, or even new product development. In truth, he was an invisible cog that probably wouldn’t even be missed by anyone but the girl who collected for the coffee fund.
That was a depressing thought that got worse the longer he dwelt on it. His sister Marcia lived a few hundred miles away, but other than occasional phone calls on birthdays and major holidays, they had no real contact. Cancer had claimed both parents, and any extended family were little better than strangers. He did have friends. Mark and Lester were long-time buds who he used to do a lot with. Then Lester got married, and Mark got that promotion. They hadn’t done much in a while. He’d been meaning to call Kathy about going to a movie for a long time. And the Pralls, who lived in the condo next to his, had invited him to play cards at least a half-dozen times.
It was ironic. He’d made the plunge buying a BodMod in order to shake his life up a little, get out of the rut formed by years of being a loner. Twisting his head back around, Jake surveyed the shaggy gray body that seemed to be his. This was one Hell of a shakeup.
What now? Could this be reversed? The suit’s safeguard buffer should still hold his original pattern, and the nanobots hadn’t been turned off yet. However, Rodger had sounded pretty certain that he was stuck as a donkey. There were a couple of possibilities. The imposter might be lying, but Jake somehow doubted that. That left either a problem with the nanobots, or the pattern buffer.
They couldn’t know for sure about any damage to the nanobots. In fact, they were looking for the facial overlay, which meant they expected the suit to work. But how could they know about a problem with the buffer? Jake looked towards the door in sudden realization. His BodMod must have broadcast the buffer pattern to the imposter – what if the buffer had been erased at the same time?
The more he thought about it, the more likely that scenario seemed. And that meant he was totally screwed. Stripped of all other ID sources, that stored pattern was his only claim to being Jake Bradner. That, and his face. Assuming that they didn’t find the missing overlay.
Jake sighed and lay his head back down. Would they think of checking his cubicle at the office? He’d had the suit shipped there because no one was home to sign for it during the day. Since he wasn’t going to use the facial overlay, he’d kept it in his top drawer as a kind of morale booster. When he felt bored or frustrated, he pulled it out and fantasize about all the things he would do with his new body. Somehow, none of those daydreams had involved grazing.
He sure didn’t want to remain a freak. At best, he’d be a curiosity for the tabloids. But his alternative was becoming a jackass. How well would he function on four legs? He lacked the basic instincts that even a newborn foal would have. That didn’t make sense, come to think of it. How could they pass him off as a donkey if he couldn’t even walk?
Unless – there had been some reports a while back about research into using BodMods to rehabilitate criminals and brain damaged patients though implanted mental patterns. It had been wildly controversial, for the test subjects apparently lost all memory of their original selves. If the mental pattern of a real jackass was incorporated into this suit… Jake shivered.
Without a mirror, it was impossible to tell how much was left of his head. He seemed to be looking straight out from the end of the animal neck – did that mean his skull had already been changed? His brain must be partly restructured to fit. He did a mental inventory of math and language skills. Everything seemed to be there. Of course, if he’d lost knowledge, would he know it?
His captors kept their voices down, and he only picked up occasional mumbling from the other room. The phone rang twice – a wrong number and a reminder for the dental appointment he had next week. Rodger told the girl about his upcoming trip to Australia and changed it to the following month. More camouflage for Jake’s disappearance. He wondered idly what the dentist would make of his mouth now. The overlay he had used to straighten and whiten his original teeth had reworked them again. They felt oversized and flat – appropriate for an herbivore.
Judging by the sunlight coming in the bedroom window, it was early evening when Jake’s bladder began to send warning signals. He brayed as quietly as he could in hopes of attracting attention.
The Hispanic kid stuck his head in. “You’d better shut up if you know what’s good for you!” Then he shut the door again.
Feel pressure build quickly, he repeated the bray. This time the door was flung open and he cringed as the kid raised a fist to strike him.
“Hold it!” The imposter came in behind him. “He was quiet about it. He must want something.” Rodger glanced at the water and carrots, then smiled suddenly as he checked Jake. “OK. I see the problem.” Jake flushed, realizing why his need was so obvious. He had started to drop like an animal.
Rodger squatted down next to him and sighed. “You’ve been pretty good so far. You’ll be in this room for at least another day or two. If you will stay quiet and cooperate, I’ll untie you so you can move around a little. Otherwise, we’ll leave you to lie in your own filth.”
Jake nodded vigorously, anxious to get untied. What little control he had managed so far was starting to fail. As soon as the imposter had untied him, he scrambled up and started for the bathroom, only to have his path blocked by Roger. “Sorry, has to be in here.” Frustrated and mortified, Jake trotted around to the far side of the bed. It wasn’t until after the carpet was ruined that he realized walking on four legs had come quite naturally.
This discovery was a mixed blessing. Mobility wouldn’t be a problem, but it indicated that his mind had already been rewired in subtle ways. As did his body’s lack of control. The need to urinate was followed, rather naturally, by solid waste that caught him by surprise. Even so, he found himself at least slightly amused when his first thought was how this might affect his security deposit.
Wrinkling his nose, the Hispanic kid muttered some obscenities and left. Roger stayed behind, watching Jake curiously. “I’m guessing the body mods are wired in properly. Damn, I wish you could still talk.” Then he grinned at Jake’s angry snort. “Yeah, well, that’s my fault, isn’t it?”
“In case you are wondering why we did this to you, it wasn’t anything personal. You just happened to fit the profile we needed. Single, male, healthy, with few outside contacts and an interest in non-commercial BodMods. Funny thing was, you were in the top ten even before we saw you worked for Portal. In fact…”
Denise interrupted at that point, shouting from the living room. “Get in here, Roger! It’s Ashland! We’re fucked! Totally fucked!”
Ashland? Who was that? From the look on the imposter’s face, someone important. He spun and practically ran out, jerking the door shut behind him. Even without Denise’s less-than-delicate assessment, it was easy to tell that something had gone very wrong. There was muffled shouting, curses, and the thud of something heavy being thrown. However, any pleasure he got was cut short by the thought that they might not need him alive any more.
Even stuck as a donkey freak, Jake wasn’t ready to die. The only ways out were the door to the living room and the third-floor window. There was a voice-only phone by the bed. He could call emergency services without an ID, but to what purpose? He had no voice, no hands to type a message. What would happen if he simply pulled the handset off the hook and dialed 911? Maybe he could…
The door was thrown open, and Denise stormed in, holding some sort of pistol. Jake brayed in terror and backed away, ears back, then spun and ran for the window as she pointed it at him. There were two soft pops followed almost instantly by pain in his rump and side. Even so, he tried to launch himself up through the glass. The 3-story fall wouldn’t matter now, since he was dead already. However, his hind legs ceased working in mid-kickoff and the last thing he felt was his head slamming into the bottom sill.
Everything hurt. Muscles were cramping, and the front of his skull throbbed dully. Jake struggled to clear hazy thought, dimly aware that he shouldn’t be feeling anything at all. Senses reported odors and sounds that had no business in his downtown apartment. Opening his eyes didn’t help – it was very dark, almost pitch black, but even the faint light coming from a blurred rectangle above hurt.
Some of the smells were animal waste, though he found them more interesting than offensive. Likewise, he could make out an occasional equine whicker, and the thud of a hoof against wood. He was in a stable, or at least somebody’s barn. How had they gotten him out of the apartment building? And not that he was complaining, but why was he still alive?
The throbbing subsided enough that he was finally able to lift his head without being hit by nausea. By that time, his eyes had adjusted to the dim light, and he was able to look back at himself. There was no indication of blood on his side or rump. Apparently, whatever she had shot him with weren’t bullets. Tranquilizer darts, apparently. That explained why Denise had looked angry when she shot him – the poor girl had so wanted to slit his throat.
Jake’s ears twitched as he picked up the faint, but unmistakable sound of a whip being cracked, followed by a horse’s whinny. Rolling up, he faced the rectangle of faint light that outlined a door and felt his ears rotate automatically as he tried to listen. An unfamiliar woman’s voice was shouting. “Pull! Use those muscles!” The whip cracked again. “Come on, boy. Show me what you can do! PULL!”
The training session continued for what seemed like a long time, punctuated by the pounding thud of hooves that actually made the ground shake and some deep neighing. He felt sorry for whatever beast was being worked so hard, and wondered if he might end up feeling that whip himself. It was not a pleasant thought, but then, there weren’t too many pleasant thoughts available to him right now.
Then he heard a familiar voice whispering just outside the door. The Hispanic kid! Moving as quietly as he could, Jake rolled up to all fours and shuffled to the door. There was a gap on the hinged side wide enough to peek though. Denise and the kid were on the other side of the barn. It was easy to pick up what they were saying.
“…couldn’t she have told him it wasn’t ready?” The kid was obviously agitated and nervous. “He wasn’t supposed to use it until tomorrow.”
Denise snorted. “Deskins was hot to try out his new toy. And the mega-geek’s whore didn’t think one day would matter. Fuck!”
Deskins? As in Rupert Jonathan Deskins, CEO and owner of Portal? Jake blinked, stunned by the possibility. Roger had talked about becoming a billionaire. That would be a serious understatement if they were trying to snag Deskins. It was also impossible. Easily one of the richest men in the world, ‘RD’ as he liked to be called, was usually surrounded by an army of security and an entourage of the media. There was no way they would have a chance to kidnap him, much less stick him in some body suit like Jake’s.
“Where the fuck is Roger?” The Hispanic kid kept looking towards the sounds of animal training. “He needs to be here!”
Denise snorted. “Not if he can’t get into Portal. Son of a bitch.” She seemed mad at the world in general. “This is all screwed up. We were supposed to have today to check everything out before we tried this. Shit!”
Roger was trying to get into Portal? The overlay! Had he figured out where Jake had left it? But they were not concerned with him right now. Why go all the way into town and risk detection? Portal’s building security was one of the most… Jake blinked, realizing exactly what Roger was doing. Testing the corporate identification matrix! If it accepted Jake’s stolen patterns as genuine, it would also accept stolen patterns from Deskins! And as one of the thousands of worker bees, Jake would barely register as a blip even if they failed – probably a hundred like him had something go wrong with access every day.
Any hopes of finding out more details was lost when the two kidnappers changed the topic of conversation, comparing fight scenes of movies he’d never heard of. They were quietly arguing over highest body count totals when Roger finally arrived, carrying a colorful binder. It was the Portal employee manual that normally resided in Jake’s file drawer.
“Passed right through.” Even the eye scan.” The imposter grinned. “I do good work.”
Denise snorted. “As if you ever let us forget?” She glanced at her watch. “Cutting it pretty close, aren’t you?”
The imposter shook his head. “Not hardly. He’ll stretch the session out as long as possible. Remember, he’s got a new toy to play with. And he thinks he has to put it away when he’s done.”
“Oh, yeah.” The Hispanic kid chuckled. “This is gonna be worth the price of admission.”
“Stay out here and keep your ears open.” Roger looked back to where the training session could still be heard. “When you hear the main door sliding open, come back to the stall.” He turned to Denise. “You can help me check the setup. Come on.” The girl muttered something darkly, but followed the imposter out of Jake’s limited field of vision.
It seemed that Roger was right about Deskins wanting to play, for the shouts and thuds lasted far longer than Jake thought possible. The Hispanic kid was sitting on the ground, tossing a switchblade into the air, when there was the rumble of a sliding door. He scrambled up and vanished to the side, presumably joining the other kidnappers.
The woman’s voice was much clearer now, as was the labored, deep breathing of something large, accompanied by a faint jingling. After a moment, they came into view, the woman leading. Ashland, if this was her, was not what he expected for what must be a top-dollar female companion. Maybe 30, she looked more like the stereotypical ‘girl back home’, with long red hair pulled back in a ponytail, and a pleasant, lightly-freckled face. Pretty, but not the kind of drop-dead gorgeous model that Deskins could easily afford.
Jake blinked in bewilderment at the creature on the other end of the lead. It appeared to be a heavily muscled black pony walking on its hind legs. The creature was wearing a polished black leather harness with silver buckles that jingled slightly with each plodding step. There were marks in the wet, lathered hide where the straps had dug in across its powerful chest, and sweat was dripping from almost every part of the thick body.
Was this actually ‘RD’? Jake couldn’t imagine anything more different from the software tycoon’s real appearance. Deskins was tall and thin, almost frail-looking, and insisted on wearing glasses instead of having his vision corrected medically. He had no known personal life, supposedly devoting all waking hours to running his global empire. Most cartoons depicted him as a sexless, emotionless robot.
This humanoid equine was the embodiment of natural strength, looking like a plow horse coming back from the fields. Even though it was not full sized, the BodMod was at least seven feet tall and had to weigh 800 pounds. Other than size and the odd arms that appeared to double as forelegs, there were no discernable differences from an actual animal. Definitely not a robot.
And far from sexless. As they passed in front of Jake’s stall, it became obvious the stallion had a huge erection. Coal black, the equine organ slapped up against his rounded, black-furred belly with each step. What had him so excited? Anticipation of attentions from Ashland? That seemed to fit, since the woman was crooning to him about being such a ‘big, strong boy’ and being ready for his ‘rubdown.’
Unfortunately, he didn’t get the opportunity to find out. They passed out of his view, moving into a stall across the barn. Jake briefly considered trying to warn his employer, but dismissed the idea almost instantly. All he could do was wheeze and bray, and RD was hardly in a condition to notice the noises of a jackass in a barn. Besides which, Denise would be quick to silence him permanently.
Curiously, Ashland maintained the soothing praise of her ‘wonderful draft horse’ with no indication of any sexual activity. There was a jingle of hardware, probably the sweat-soaked harness being pulled off. RD’s breathing actually slowed, and except for an occasional whuffle and the continued chatter from his groom, the stable was quiet. Finally, after what felt like a long time, he heard Ashland open the stall door. “OK, boy. Time to end the game.” There was a hint of amusement in her voice, and Jake suddenly knew why.
There was silence for a moment, then a grunt. Having gone through this before, Jake knew what was coming. RD whickered, and there was a thud as he banged heavily against the wall. Then a squeal of pain and fear filled the air, making Jake cringe back with his ears flat. The ground and walls shook as jackhammer hooves pounded and kicked. And above even that thundering noise, he heard Roger’s whoop of triumph.
“Got it!”
The stallion’s struggles did not last as long as Jake’s and the new animal shifted around in his stall quietly immediately afterwards, indicating he was still conscious. Maybe because he had so little left to change? If they followed the pattern attempted with Jake, RD had become a normal horse when he triggered shutdown. That would have affected his arms and hands, and maybe some of the upper body. Jake shivered a bit, remembering the fully equine head. What had they done to the man’s mind?
Ashland apparently assumed Deskins was still aware. Her voice cut through the silence with a cold cruelty that had not been there before. “Getting settled now, Ardee?” The pronunciation of his nickname was different. “You went to so much trouble setting up this horsie game, I decided to help you out. Now you get to play horsie from now on!”
The stallion squealed and kicked at the side of his stall.
The woman’s tone became mocking. “Pull, boy! Use those muscles! Well, that’s all you have now, ‘boy.’ Oh, wait! You get the parts of being a horse you always sorta forgot about. Flies, standing in your own shit, eating when I want to feed you. I wonder if really being a beast of burden will get you as hard as pretending. Maybe we can find you some nice mares.” She laughed. “If I don’t decide to geld you instead.”
“Oh, no.” A man who sounded vaguely familiar joined Ashland. “I think we owe Ardee here a long and happy life. After all, he just gave us his entire fortune!”
Jake shivered, suddenly recognizing the voice of his former boss. Except that this must be Roger again. The imposter must have had another BodMod suit already prepared. That explained the setup he had Denise helping with – once he had the identification codes programmed in, all he had to do was shuck the Jake Bradner suit and step into Rupert Jonathan Deskins. From the bottom of the corporate ladder to the topmost rung in one easy step!
“You said I could have him!” The woman sounded angry. “That was part of the deal!”
“I said you could continue to take care of him.” It was strange to hear Deskin’s voice discussing his own fate. “I will maintain ownership of this property, and everything in it. Including Ardee, there.”
“Why do you care what I do with him?” Ashland’s challenge was followed by a short silence, after which she mumbled, “Uh, never mind. Of course I’ll take proper care of him.” Jake could only imagine the look Roger had used to alter the dominatrix’s attitude.
“I’m sure you will.” The imposter stepped into Jake’s field of vision, looking toward his stall. Roger was naked, and squinting slightly, but he did not seemed at all self-conscious. “As well as Jake, once we are done with him.” He peered a little closer, then grinned. “Quite the curious donkey, aren’t you?”
Jake jerked back form the crack a moment, then sighed and resumed looking out. He’d already been spotted.
“Ah, there we are.” Roger had moved closer, and was still grinning. “I’m sure you’ll be glad to know I found the missing overlay in your desk. It was the only place left to look.”
A sick feeling flooded Jake’s gut. Were they going to finish him off now? He saw Ashland move to look at him over the fake Deskins’ shoulder. She had a slight smile that did nothing to inspire hope.
“Here!” Denise appeared, thrusting an armful of folded clothing at the imposter. “Unless you want to streak the Board of Directors?”
Roger took the horn-rimmed glasses off the top of the pile and slipped them on. After blinking a few times, he shook his head. “Damn. The richest man in the world and he still insists on wearing glasses. That’s one thing I’m gonna change right off.” He unfolded the shirt to pull it on and wrinkled his nose in distaste. “Not to mention his wardrobe.”
“I thought you said no changes!” Denise scowled. “If we can’t do anything, then you sure as Hell shouldn’t.”
Something unpleasant flickered behind the imposter’s now pale-blue eyes, but he had a smile on his face when he turned to the girl. “Not right away. Still, I am glad to hear that you remembered some of the rules. However, remember that you and the others got to choose your new looks. I’m stuck as nerd-boy.”
“Nerd-Boy Billionaire.” Denise snorted. “Well, I can be very happy with my share and this body. She struck a slutty pose. “What do you think, Mr. CEO? Want a teenage girlfriend?”
Ashland gave a scornful laugh. “Who used to be a 40 year-old guy? I think he’ll at least want a real woman.”
That distracted Jake from his own worries a moment. Denise had been a guy? It occurred to him that all three of the accomplices were awfully young to be working something this big. Not one looked over twenty. Roger must have provided them with custom BodMods, programming illegal age changes along with their chosen appearances. As if the imposter was concerned with the law.
“Like you?” It was the psycho’s turn to scoff. “A homely bitch who likes to whip the horsies? Why don’t you try hooking up with our friend in there? He’s more your speed.” She indicated Jake’s stall.
“Enough!” Roger might look silly stepping into Deskins’ boxer shorts, but his tone brooked no argument. Both females fell silent, though they continued to glare at each other. “You!” He looked at Ashland. “The paperwork for our two guests is in my briefcase. Both of the real animals were destroyed, so there won’t be a conflict later. Set them up as regular occupants. We’ll have to keep them both in quarantine until the nanobots finish up.”
After the redhead nodded and left, he turned to Denise. “You and Oscar load all the equipment back into the van. Make sure you get everything. Then head back to the warehouse. Wait there. I’ll be in touch as soon as I get to Deskins’ place.”
When Roger finished dressing, he brushed Deskins’ trademark shock of sandy hair away from his glasses and turned to grin at Jake. “Well, what do you think? Nerdy enough?” His smile turned a bit sad. “Well, I suppose it is time to complete your transition out of humanity.” The imposter glanced to the side. “Oscar! Bring me that binder!”
Not surprisingly, Oscar was the Hispanic kid. Jake wondered idly what he had looked like before, and if anyone had been ‘destroyed’ to provide a conflict-free identity. He backed away from the gate as the olive-skinned youth opened it. This donkey body already had more mass and strength than his human form. If he charged through, he might be able to…
The imposter seemed to read his mind. “All the outside doors are bolted, and the only other people here are Denise and Ashland. Even if you somehow succeeded, you are a freak. That isn’t going to change unless you finish up.” The man stepped in, holding the overlay. It was a harmless-looking thing, a translucent oval of filmy white material. However, once activated, it would take the last traces of Jake’s humanity.
Roger squatted down a few feet away, that sad smile still present. “I truly am sorry about this. You didn’t do anything to deserve this, except maybe forget to have a life. That’s why I picked you, you know. No real family contact, few friends, and certainly no loved ones.” The assessment was all the more painful because it was true.
“You aren’t going to die.” The imposter stared at the overlay. “I’ve programmed both of you to have the instincts and thoughts of the animals you now are, but you will never completely forget your past. Being animals will just feel, well, right. It’s the best I can do.” He flipped the overlay over, looking around the featureless surface, and then frowned. “Shit!”
Standing up suddenly, the imposter moved out into the main stable and held the fabric up to the light, obviously searching for something. “Dammit!”
Oscar looked alarmed. “What’s wrong?
“The activation code isn’t printed on it. They forgot to stamp this piece. God-damned sloppy made-in-America crap!” Roger spun around, and slammed the gate shut. “Where’s the paperwork from his apartment?”
“Cindy was supposed to clean everything up.” The kid sounded nervous. “Um, you told her to throw all that stuff out, remember?”
“Shit!” The gate rattled, apparently from a kick. “I haven’t got time for this. Call her. There’s a phone in the office. Tell her to find the damned activation code number. It will be on the inside cover of the manual, and on the Authenticity Certificate.”
After a few moments of silence, the imposter opened the gate again and looked in. He appeared calm, but the smile was gone. “OK. Listen up. Deskins has a regular board meeting in a few hours, and the prick is never, ever late. If I can’t get you done now, it will have to wait until tonight.”
He glanced at Deskin’s famous Mickey Mouse watch. “Shit! I hate cutting things this close. Stay quiet and don’t cause trouble. You still have a chance for a very pleasant life. Don’t screw it up being stupid. Denise is itching for a chance to kill something.”
“Uh, Rog?” The kid called back from somewhere near the sliding door. “She’s already on her way here. All that stuff got incinerated.”
Rodger closed his eyes a moment and sighed. “Of course. Efficiency when I don’t need it.” He shut the stall door again, gently this time, and his voice got fainter as they moved away. “OK. Change of plan. Forget the warehouse. Just wait here. I should be able to scan the code when I come back later. If not…”
“Why wait?” The psycho bitch, of course. “Deskins is a done deal. Once we are rid of the freak, there’s no way for anyone to trace us. I can get rid of his head and leave the rest to the wolves.”
As grateful as he was for Roger’s belated compassion, Jake was wondering the same thing.
“Let’s just say I like to keep my options open. Chill, Denise. If I can’t get him finished up my way by tonight, you can do anything you want.” There was a pause. “Look, it’s almost six. I’ve got to get back into the city for the board meeting. Go ahead and pack up everything but the scanner – that’s the blue and white box – and be ready to roll tonight.”
There was mumbled agreement, and then the sound of a door creaking. However, neither accomplice spoke until the sound of tires crunching on gravel indicated that Roger had left.
“Fuck cleanup!” Oscar sounded a lot braver with his boss gone. “I’m beat. He won’t be back until late this afternoon. I’m gonna take a nap.”
Denise didn’t seem to object to the idea. “What about the freakshow?”
“No way they can get out. Let the whore deal with ‘em.”
The both laughed, and after a moment, the door opened and shut again. Jake heard a faint click, and then the barn was quiet. He heard some shuffling and a whinny from a real horses, but the end where they had taken Deskins was silent. Too silent. There was no psycho bitch with a knife keeping Roger’s newest victim from voicing his fear, yet Ardee hadn’t so much as nickered since his former groom had left. Had the equine mentality already taken over?
Sighing, Jake contemplated his own dark future. Whatever patience Roger had was wearing thin. Unless something changed before tonight, Jake would either be a normal animal or dead. And he wasn’t all that sure there would be a difference between the two. Once the donor donkey’s mental pattern was implanted, would he be Jake Bradner or a reincarnated jackass?
The only alternative was escape. Assuming that was possible. Assuming. What was the old line? Assume makes an ASS of U and ME. Well, he’d already taken care of the ME part, so there wasn’t much to lose, was there?
He made a circuit of the enclosure, pressing his side against the walls. It was fairly small, OK for him, but probably too small for even a medium-sized horse. The lack of windows or other openings was puzzling at first. Except, maybe this wasn’t a stall. An old storage room, perhaps? Hiding him from Deskins, most likely.
He couldn’t feel an inside handle, and didn’t remember seeing one while the door was open. It creaked some when he leaned against it, but remained solidly shut. There had to be some sort of latch outside. Bumping it with his shoulder didn’t accomplish anything. He kept at it, growing more frustrated, until he finally spun around and let fly with both hind hooves.
The door popped up at the bottom with a crack and splinter, then banged back into place crookedly. Jake cringed, fearing the noise would bring someone running, but after a minute, he slowly relaxed. Moving closer, he saw that the bottom hinge had torn free. Butting the lopsided panel with his head, he pushed through the opening and into the comparatively bright light of the main stable.
There were ten stalls on both side of the wide center aisle, and what might be rooms for tack or people down by the sliding door where Ashland and Ardee had come in. A buff-colored horse looked out over its stall gate and snuffled in his direction, then snorted, and withdrew. Jake felt vaguely insulted, and then decided that being ignored was the best thing.
The sliding door was very solid and too heavy for him to budge. One of the rooms was open, and had racks for hanging saddles and harnesses. The other was shut and locked, but had a worn paper index card with operating hours typed on it. Obviously the office Oscar had called from.
A loud creak made his heart stop a moment, and he spun around expecting to see one of his captors. The sound was repeated, and he followed it to a large stall almost all the way down at the other end. This one had steel bars filling the openings, and much heavier construction than that of the storage room. He could just barely make out the dark shape inside, knowing who it must be.
Dropped to all fours, Deskins was not even as big as their dun stable mate, though that would likely change quickly. Every scrap of food, every drop of moisture he consumed would be raw material for the nanites. They even scavenged traces elements from the air itself, so starving wouldn’t stop the process.
In truth, however, size was the only indication that the former human had ever been anything other than a quadruped. His nostrils flared, seeking Jake’s scent, pear-shaped ears pricked up curiously. Then he snorted once, shook his head, and neighed loudly as he pounded at the base of the gate with one hoof. Was it Deskins or the stallion that wanted out?
Jake moved close and tried to focus on the latch. It consisted of heavy sliding bolts at the top and bottom, inaccessible from the inside. A full-sized draft animal might be able to break out the same way Jake had, but Ardee still lacked the mass to crack these timbers.
Ironically, Jake found himself wishing he had the elongated muzzle and strong lips that the overlay would have granted. While he was able to work the bottom latch without much trouble, the upper bolt was just high enough to be out of reach. The stallion watched him straining, and then snorted and tried throwing his shoulder against the back side again. As before, the gate simply vibrated a little. Ardee whinnied and pawed at the barrier again, tossing his head impatiently.
Even as a horse, the prick was still trying to boss him around! Annoyed, Jake gave a loud ‘haaawww’ and dropped back to all fours. His mouth was sore from trying to manipulate the cold steel, and he had gotten a small splinter in his lower lip. Then Ardee stopped moving, regarding him with a fully animal brown eye. After a moment, the horse made a strange sound – something between a wheeze and a squeal. It was not a command, but a plea.
Dammit! Even though he half expected Denise to come bursting in on them any moment, Jake started to look around for something to stand on. It seemed that Deskins was hanging on to at least part of his intelligence, and if he wanted to spend his last sentient hours free of the stall, then Jake would do his best to help him. It didn’t hurt realizing that the larger animal might be able to break through one of the outer doors.
There was nothing in the aisle but a plastic water bucket that would never support his weight. Maybe something in the tack room… Jake suddenly remembered that Roger had left equipment somewhere close by. A check of the open stall on the far side of Ardee’s turned up a jackpot. There was an empty BodMod support frame and some electronic equipment he didn’t recognize, along with a couple of stacked cases. One of the heavy boxes looked like it would make a decent step, and even had a handle he could grip with his teeth.
A dark blob moved in the far corner of the stall as he stepped in, causing Jake to recoil in fear. It took all of his willpower to take another look, and he realized the odd looking mound was simply shrinking. A faint rancid odor hit his nostrils as he moved closer, and the pounding of his heart changed to a growing sickness.
It was him. Or at least, all that remained of Jake Bradner. The BodMod suit Roger had used to steal his identity had been tossed casually aside, a thin, flesh-colored bag that still had enough of his face showing to be recognizable. For just a moment, Jake felt a thrill of joy. All he had to do was get this suit over his body – which would require hands, plus a viable ID to activate it.
And even given those now unobtainable assets, Jake was too late. The imposter had turned the BodMod off, and it was in the process of decomposition. All he could do was watch helplessly as his human identity dissolved into the straw.
A heavy thud startled Jake out of his despair. Although he felt a surge of annoyance, watching the last traces of the BodMod crumble away wouldn’t accomplish anything. Using his teeth, he dragged the case out by its handle and butted it into position with his head. Getting up on the improvised step took a little doing, but he managed to ‘walk’ up the gate and work the upper latch open.
Deskins burst out of the stall before he could get down, and the gate knocked him backwards onto the floor. Jake’s outraged bray was ignored as the horse trotted to the far end of the stable. Instead of looking for an escape route, Deskins backed up to the office door and pressed his rump against it. There was a splintering sound as he rocked back hard, and then immediately turned and pushed his way inside.
Still angry, Jake rolled back up to all fours and shook himself, then followed. The bastard would be in for something of a shock if he thought he could use the phone. With no hands or voices, all either of them could do would be knock the handset off. He was surprised to see the light come on, and found the former mogul lipping at something on the desk. Papers and books hit the floor as he chased the object around, but he finally raised his head to display a green highlighter marker held between his teeth like a cigarette.
Shouldering the desk to the side, Deskins worked his way to the back of the office. Jake had to rear up a little to see the computer that was obviously the horse’s objective. Stupid geek! As if accessing a computer was easier! Even if he knew Ashland’s password, he couldn’t work the mouse. The equine head bobbed down, and the screen popped up in standby mode. A horse whinny came from the speakers, followed by Portal’s trademarked male voice. “Good morning. Please sign in.” Jake blinked, realizing it belonged to Deskins.
The horse gave a whicker as its head began to bob over the keyboard. He must be using the marker to hit keys. “I’m sorry. That is not an authorized ID. Please try again.” Jake shifted around, trying to find an angle where he could see the screen. The error message was repeated as he moved to the other side of the desk, and Deskins stomped the ground with a fore hoof. One more time and the system would lock. Was he guessing at the password, or just unable to hit the right keys?
As he finally found a point where he could see the familiar Portal login screen, the computer gave a warning bleep and went dark. So much for that. Sighing, Jake started to turn away, then saw the monitor light up again with a screen he hadn’t seen in years. The background was a soft green, with a stylized open door in the center. The original Portal logo – modernized at least five software versions ago. What was such obsolete software doing on what looked like a new system?
Deskins stared at the monitor a moment, then turned to Jake and whuffled. When he did not respond, the horse stomped a hoof again and jerked his head in an obvious prompt. As soon as Jake shuffled towards him, the equine‘s head started bobbing over the keyboard again. A small window popped up – the basic text editor that had been part of the original Portal’s accessories.
U HLP WRK KYS. FND STK PEN SMEHTNG.
Jake squinted at the letters appearing on the screen. ‘You help work keys?’ The next was harder. Find what? Stick! Stick, pen, something! Impressed despite his annoyance, he searched the mess on the floor and found a pencil. It was difficult to pick up, as he had to practically do a face plant, but he finally managed.
As soon as he had the implement, Deskins started typing again. I STP 1 PRS ALT I STMP 2 PRS CNTL. I stop I person? No, the second part had a 2. I stop 1 press.. what? Jake blinked a moment, then realized what the shorthand meant. Not stop. Stomp! Deskins would stomp once when he wanted the ALT key pressed, and twice for the Control key! He nodded, and reared up to get his fore hooves on the edge of the desk.
Deskins cleared the text editor and gave a single stomp. Jake clamped the pencil solidly and poked at the keyboard. The Cap Lock light went out. Damn! Rolling his eyes down, he tried again, and saw Deskins nod. He typed something and a small blank window popped up. Two stomps. Jake shift his head very slightly and found the Control key. The blank window went away, and a text box appeared. Deskins nosed Jake’s head away, and very slowly and deliberately started entering a string of characters that showed up as a long line of asterisks. He paused when he was done, then poked down the Enter key.
The monitor flicked again, this time changing to the newest Portal desktop. The words ‘MASTER ACCESS’ appeared in all four corners, and the computer’s voice spoke. “Welcome to Portal.” Deskins stomped once, and Jake found the Alt key again. The password fields for both the user login and internet access both had ‘MASTER ACCESS’ already entered. Apparently, there was some sort of hidden code that cancelled all security passwords!
Using command keys and tabbing instead of the usual mouse clicks, Deskins navigated to the Portal Corporate web site, and brought up the legal notice page. What was the point of this? There was nothing one the screen but fine print that probably hadn’t been looked at since the webmaster posted it.
Two stomps. Jake pushed the Alt key down while Deskin’s head bobbed. A new text box appeared in the middle of the screen. The horse typed another meaningless string of characters, then hit Enter. A red border appeared around the outer edge of the web page, and a message box popped up reading ‘Manual Mode.” That seems pointless – they were already doing manual entry. Deskins stomped once for the Control key, then pressed a key that made the printer click and spit out a page. Then he logged off.
Jake started to move away, thinking they were done, only to get another hoof stomp. The stallion navigated to a web page that displayed another logon screen against a plain white background. It took Ardee two tries to get the codes entered correctly, but then the screen changed to an elaborate and rather elegant-looking web site showing a beach scene complete with rolling waves and palm trees swaying in a virtual breeze.
“Welcome to the Bank of Bermuda, Limited.” The computer-generated voice was one of the better artificial entities Jake had heard, but given the probable wealth of most clients, they didn’t have to economize. “Please provide an ID scan or enter your access code.” Ardee very carefully punched in a long series of characters. “Thank you, Miss Moore. How may we assist you? Please speak or enter your desired transaction.”
Miss Moore? What the Hell was Ardee up to? Jake followed the big stallion’s hoof stomps again as they navigated through several screens. The horse had to back up several times when he apparently entered incorrect code. Was he guessing?
Then a message box began flashing the message ‘Record Now.’ Ardee stepped back and then whinnied at Jake. What did the horse want him to do? Record what? He brayed, reminding Deskins that he didn’t have a voice, either. The horse gave a frustrated snort, then took a step towards him. Braying in annoyance, Jake started to back away, only to have teeth clamp on the back of his neck. Struggling only made Ardee bite down harder, and Jake forced himself to relax. What the Hell was the stallion up to?
Responding to the firm pressure, Jake found himself being posed with his face nearly up against the computer screen. He blinked as Ardee’s teeth let go, then realized that his right eye was directly in front of the ID scanner. A retinal scan! There was a flash of light from the scanner, followed by a double-beep from the computer. “ID scan accepted. Thank you. Please wait while your records are updated.” Ardee printed out this page as well.
Jake’s eye was the lock for the bank account! Why hadn’t Ardee recorded his own pattern? Maybe the scanner would not recognize animal patterns. Although Jake’s eyes had been altered, they still retained most of their human appearance
“Shit! Get away from there!” Startled, Jake look back to see Denise lunging into the office with her switchblade out. She slashed at Deskin’s back end just as both hind hooves shot out. There was a spray of crimson and the crack of bones, with Deskins falling sideways into the desk and the psycho bitch flying backwards into the stable.
Jake launched himself at the door, knocking it closed and bracing himself to hold it shut. Screams and curses provided ample evidence that Denise had survived, and he was relieved to see his fellow victim stand up again. The sleek black hide was matted with blood, but even as he watched, the wound started to close up. As long as the BodMod was activated, it was self-repairing.
Deskins had dropped his marker in the attack, and started nosing around the floor as someone threw themselves at the door. Oscar, judging from the voice that shouted angrily on the other side. Although he didn’t weigh much more than he had as a human, Jake found that he was a lot stronger. The stallion snorted, then dropped his head suddenly. When he raised it again, the marker was back in his lips.
The door shuddered again and again, with curses from the young man between impacts. Jake could feel the door starting to give – if Oscar thought to shift his attacks above the point where Jake was bracing, the top hinge would pop. Ardee was just standing there, staring at the computer screen. It took a loud bray to startle the stallion out of whatever thought he was lost in, and he finally started poking uncertainly at the keyboard. Then the lights went out.
They could hear Denise still screaming about cutting their balls off, and Oscar added a few ideas of his own. However, it was Ashland’s shouted “Shut Up!” that got the two victims’ attention.
“OK, Ardee.” The stable mistress spoke through the door with an almost conversational tone. “What were you trying to do? Make a phone call? Get help though the Internet? A little hard without hands or a voice, but I’m not going to take the chance you didn’t accomplish something.”
“Oh, crap!” Oscar sounded panicked. A moment later, the door shuddered several times as someone threw themselves against it. “Come on! Help me! We gotta get in there!”
“Why?” Ashland actually sounded amused. “The power is off. They can’t do a damned thing except stand there in the dark.”
“I’m gonna kill him!” The young man sounded determined.
There was a short pause. “I’ll forget you said that. This time.” The stable mistress’s voice raised hair on Jake’s neck. “Both of you need to get one thing really clear in your heads. Both Ardee and Jake are mine. Hurt them, and I will hurt you. A lot worse.”
“Fuck off, bitch!” Denise, charming as ever, joined in. “That sack of horseshit is going down! He broke my fucking shoulder!”
“Which is already healed, right? And I don’t think that’s ketchup on your hand. You sliced him.”
“That’s just for starters, bitch! I’m gonna chop him into dog food. You think you’re tough enough to take me on? You fucking high-dollar whore! Just because..”
Whatever Denise had to say was cut off by a sharp crack and a thud. Then Oscar spoke in a hushed tone. “Shit! You killed her!”
“Not this time.” Jake blinked, for the speaker was Ashland. “Just knocked her out. This ‘high-dollar whore’ spent two tours in the Green Berets. Now drag her sorry ass outa my sight. Now! If there’s a next time, she won’t wake up.”
There was some muttering from the Hispanic kid, but nothing Jake could understand. After a minute or so of silence, there was a knock on the door.
“OK, Ardee.” Ashland seemed calm again. “Those two won’t be a problem. I can promise you that. But we have a problem. You are being a bad horse. And Mistress doesn’t like bad horses. Does Ardee want his mistress to sell him?”
Jake rolled his eyes and snorted. This girl was as nuts as Denise! Did she think Deskins would be so stupid – did he just hear the stallion actually whimper? It was hard to make out more than outlines in the near pitch-black office, but the horse’s head had dropped, and his ears seemed to have flattened.
“Ardee is a real horse now. Ardee is going to big and strong and beautiful, just like Ardee always wanted. No board meetings, no accountants, no pressure. And Mistress will take good care of Ardee. But only if Ardee is a good horse. Let Mistress in now, Ardee. Show Mistress you are a good horse.”
Deskins had lowered his head even more, obviously embarrassed by Ashland’s condescending tone. He turned awkwardly in the tight space, knocking over a chair in the process, and moved to stand next to Jake in front of the door. Let her try getting in now!
“Ardee needs someone to take care of him now. To feed him, and groom him, and make sure he stays healthy. Mistress wants to do all that for her Ardee. That’s why Mistress asked for Ardee. Show Mistress that you want to be hers. Be Mistress’s big, strong, good horse.”
Jake would have laughed – except that he was knocked over suddenly as Deskins butted him aside with a sweep of his head. Braying in surprise, Jake scrambled back up and threw himself at the opening door. But the horse planted a hoof as a stop, preventing it from closing. Ashland stepped in and stroked Ardee’s muzzle. “I knew you were my good boy.” In the light from the doorway, it was obvious Deskins was trembling, his eyes wide and ears perked up. The very picture of an adoring pet.
For a moment, Jake thought he might get physically ill. Then he realized that Deskins probably couldn’t help himself. Roger had said they would both be happy as animals, and Jake’s own relative comfort on four legs was a good indication that was true. And he had been spared the full transformation so far. Ardee probably had the donor stallion’s mental imprint gaining strength every moment, aided by the former human’s already established, if somewhat kinky, interests.
Ashland took a moment to caress the stallion’s head, then nodded to herself slightly and glanced down at Jake. “OK. Let’s put all our cards on the table. Your human identities are gone. Roger rigged the suits so that neither of you could ever testify against him. I don’t know exactly what would happen if you tried to reverse or change anything, but it wouldn’t be nice. So count on the fact you are both out of the system for good. You need me.”
And she obviously needed them, or at least Ardee, for something. Jake flinched as the stable mistress reached out to his head. Only to feel a pleasant scratching between his ears.
“I should be pissed with you, donkey. You’ve screwed things up big time.” She sighed. “Well, OK. I am pissed. But I also admire you for not giving up. Not enough to keep from killing you myself if you fuck with me again, but enough to take you on as a companion for Ardee.”
The stallion whuffled at the sound of his name and moved forward to nose her hand. She stared at him with a curious expression – distaste? – that gradually shifted to a bemused smile. “Are you jealous already?” She stroked Deskins’ muzzle with her other hand. “OK, Ardee. What did you do? And both of you had better hope that Mistress didn’t get screwed over too badly.”
Turning awkwardly, Deskins nosed the printer. Ashland pulled out the pages from the tray and frowned at the top one. “What is this? What does ‘manual mode’ mean?” She stared up at the horse. “You did something to screw up Roger’s plan, didn’t you?”
Ardee nodded his head and whickered.
“Oh, shit!” She crumpled the page in her fist and glared back at Jake. “If that’s true, then you and your little buddy here just signed your own death warrants. They’ll gut the two of you, and I’ll help.”
Snorting loudly, Ardee nosed the hand holding the other printout. She held it up to the light. “Bank of Bermuda?” She looked puzzled. “A bank account in my name?” Ardee nodded again. Ashland smiled slightly. “Ardee is a very, very smart horse. Mistress will take care of Ardee and Jake. IF I can verify this.”
Ashland went back out and hit the circuit breakers, then returned and pulled a chair back over in front of the computer. The login screen was normal this time, and Portal’s trademarked synthetic voice asked her for an ID scan. She leaned forward to the optical scanner built-in to the monitor, and then looked at the bank screen printout. Bringing up the Internet, she navigated to the bank website they had been at when the power went off.
“The Caymans?” Ashland chuckled. “I thought a traditionalist like you would have gone for Switzerland.” She manually entered the login codes from the printout, bringing the computer voice again.
“Thank you, Miss Moore. How may we assist you? Please speak or enter your desired transaction.”
Jake felt renewed despair. What had happened to the eye scan requirement? If she could access the account manually, she didn’t need either of them.
“Balance inquiry.” The stable mistress blinked and leaned closer to the screen to stare at the numbers displayed. “Oh, yes.” She could have been acknowledging good foreplay from the tone of her voice. “Oh, Ardee is a very, very good horse. Mistress is very happy.”
Considering Deskins was one of the richest men in the world, what he might consider pocket change would set most people for life. And Jake doubted that Ardee had given his Mistress pocket change. The real problem was, now that she apparently had the jackpot, why did she need to keep them around?
Ashland looked at the screen, her eyes bright and hungry. “Funds Transfer.”
The computer spoke again. “Please provide an ID scan for this function.” She leaned forward and waited. “Scan is unacceptable. Please try again.” Frowning, she tried typing in the access code manually. “An ID scan is required for this function. Please provide an ID scan for this function.”
“Oh, shit. You didn’t have my pattern to use. It’s locked to your pattern, isn’t it?” When the horse shook his head, Ashland balled her fists so tightly her knuckles turned white. “You are not stupid enough to toy with me, are you?”
Deskins stomped his hoof and snorted. It took a moment for Jake to realize what had to be done. Moving to the computer, he jumped up and looked into the scanner lens.
“Thank you, Miss Moore. Fund transfer. You have eight hundred thousand three hundred and seventy-five dollars remaining in your current fiscal year allotment. Please state or select your desired transaction.”
“An allotment? Shit!” Given Ashland’s reaction, that could only be a fraction of the total account balance. Still, the stable mistress could live quite well indeed with that much available on a yearly basis. As long as she had Jake around to access it!
“Always one step ahead, aren’t you?” The woman’s expression was grim. “Except you screwed up this time. I don’t need you around at all, do I? Just our meddling little ass here. Rather generous of you to make him indispensable. Not very smart, but generous.”
Jake brayed loudly, then moves to lean against Ardee’s leg.
She blinked, and then nodded with a slight smile. “All for one, and one for all?”
He brayed again and nodded his head.
“And you think I couldn’t break you? Even if you somehow held on, all I really need is you alive and one eye intact. I could cut off your legs and let you spend thirty years as a lump on life support. Still feeling brave?”
Sick dread almost overwhelmed him, but he took a deep breath and pressed against Ardee. Even though using Jake’s retinal pattern had been forced on the stallion, he owed Deskins whatever life he might have left.
Instead of the expected outburst of rage, Ashland actually chuckled, her smile warming considerably. “Good answer. For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t have done anything to my stallion there. If only because the horse he duplicated was a registered champion stud. You, on the other hand, continue to be a problem. If they use the facial overlay, your retinal pattern will change, and I lose everything. But I can’t tell them…”
“Tell them what?” A familiar voice came from the door and all three heads turned to look. It was the black computer hacker, Cindy.
Ashland’s hand shot out to the power bar, and the bank web site blinked off. “Nothing.”
“Where is everybody?” Cindy frowned. And what are these two doing in here? Especially him!” The girl indicated Jake. “Why isn’t he a donkey now? I thought Roger was gonna use the scanner to get the code.”
“These two are mine, now. If I want to have them in my office, in my stable, or in my bed, it’s none of your business.”
The girl did not flinch. “I don’t give a shit about your sex life!” So much for her being the demure, quiet one. “What was that on the computer?” Her eyes narrowed. “Where are Denise and Oscar?”
“It’s not my job to nursemaid your buddies, as much as they seem to need it.” The stable mistress reached behind the computer, then turned and started picking up some of the papers scattered on the desk. “They went to the house and left these two alone. Ardee and Jake were both loose when I came in to check. It’s a good thing they are too far gone to think of escaping.”
Cindy narrowed her eyes. “I don’t know what shit you are trying to pull, but I’m not falling for it. I’m getting Oscar and Denise.” She started backing towards the door.
Ashland paused as she shuffled the forms, and then pulled a drawer open to put them away. “I’m not trying to pull any ‘shit’.” She dropped the stack in the drawer. “And I think we should go see them together.” Her hand jerked back up holding a pistol. “Unless you want to argue the point?”
The black girl’s eyes widened, and she abruptly changed to an apologetic tone. “Uh, look, there’s no need for that!”
“Oh, yeah. I think there is.” The stable mistress stood up with a slight smile on her lips. “I’ve got a few things to tell you, and I don’t want to have to repeat myself.” She gestured towards the door. “After you.” She came around the desk keeping the weapon pointing at Cindy’s chest, pausing without looking back when she reached the door. “You two behave yourselves. And stay in here. Things may get ugly.”
Jake wondered what that conversation would be like, and quickly decided he was quite happy to stay here in the office. His sensitive ears heard the click of the lock on the main stable door – Ashland was not taking any chances. At least she had left the lights on. Deskins returned to the computer and nosed the blank monitor a couple of times, then lipped at the keyboard. Had he forgotten how to turn on the power strip? It turned out to be a moot point – from where he was standing, Jake spotted some cable dangling behind the desk. The stable mistress must have yanked a couple of the plugs from the back.
Now what? Jake trotted into the main barn and looked around. Escape might be possible, but probably was not wise. He had no idea where he was, or how far away any help might be. Although the others might see him as a dangerous liability, Ashland had a good reason to keep him alive. But would she be able to protect him if Roger’s plan fell apart?
He heard Ardee shuffling out behind him, and turned to see the big horse heading purposefully towards the stalls. What did he have in mind now? Deskins shuffled past the stall he had been locked in and stuck his head into the next opening. After a low whicker, the horse went inside. The BodMod equipment! Most of it was pushbutton stuff - the computer genius might be able to… that optimistic line of thought was truncated by memory of Ashland’s warning. While he wouldn’t put it past her to lie, Jake also felt certain that Roger left nothing to chance.
Neither did Deskins. There was a loud crash, followed by several thuds and bangs from inside the stall. Jake got to the opening just in time to see the horse let fly with a bleeding hind hoof, crushing a metal box against the back wall. Two more kicks destroyed the remaining equipment.
Jake stared at the ruined electronics, and gave a bray of dismay. While he didn’t want to become a full animal, having that choice taken from him upped the stakes considerably. With the facial overlay rendered useless, their kidnappers either had to work out keeping a freak, or kill him. And he had no doubt which option all but Ashland would take. Damn Deskins! He was playing with Jake’s life now!
He brayed again, this time angrily, only to fall silent as the horse slumped. The cuts in Ardee’s pale gray hide had already healed, but his ribs were showing plainly. It took a moment to remember that the former human’s change hadn’t completed yet. Ardee still had a lot of growing to do and the nanobots were running out of raw materials. Jake had never heard of a suit adding this much mass before – the horse was already noticeably taller than he’d been earlier.
Deskins shuffled out slowly, forcing Jake back, and entered his stall. Curious, Jake looked in and saw his former boss stick his muzzle into the grain bucket. Apparently finding it empty, Ardee squealed and dropped his head to attack the dry hay. Hunger was in control now. There would be no encore performance of brilliance, at least for a while.
Great. Now Jake as stuck like this for sure and all he could do was wait for the kidnappers to show up. Grumbling to himself, he shuffled down the main aisle, checking out the rest of the stable. He didn’t expect to find anything useful, but it beat standing in a stall waiting for the axe to fall. Hopefully, not literally. His exploration ended back to the office, and he stared at the useless computer. What had Deskins done while he was in there? Damn the man! If it wasn’t for him, Jake would be… where?
Dead, most likely. Even discounting Psycho Bitch’s knife, the mental implant that was part of his final change to donkey would wipe out everything that made Jake who he was. Despite the show of kindness and concern, Roger’s plans for the two of them were just as deadly as Denise’s, just less messy.
Ardee shuffled out of his stall again, this time heading towards the other end of the building. Was he going to try breaking out? Jake followed him down to the stable’s only occupied stall. The buff-colored horse looked out and whickered, ears perked forward as it sniffed at the visitors. This time he realized it was a mare, most likely brought in for the newly-created stallion. Although he lacked the equine sense of smell that had Ardee curling his upper lip and pressing close to the gate, Jake found the female disturbingly interesting in a way he hadn’t just an hour earlier.
Despite obvious arousal, Ardee shook his head and snorted, and then continued to the far end of the stable. As expected, the main doors outside were bolted and locked. His goal turned out to be not escape, but food. The last enclosure on the left contained hay bales and bags of grain. It was also secured with a solid-looking sliding latch.
The stallion pawed at the ground and pressed against the heavy wooden gate, whinnying piteously. Deskins must be starving. His nanites were trying to complete the restructuring of his body, only partially constrained by the need to preserve life functions. BodMods had never been designed for changes of this magnitude. Roger had achieved an incredible breakthrough, though neither Deskins nor Jake wre likely to ever appreciate his success.
Pushing in front of the hungry stallion with difficultly, Jake fumbled at the latch with teeth and lips. Happily, his own nanites had already healed the cuts from his earlier efforts. Even the splinter was gone, probably converted into flesh. Once the latch slid free, he looped his forelegs through the open gate and dragged it open.
Ardee took a step into the storage area, then stopped. He was trembling, ears back and eyes wide in what looked like absolute terror. Unable to voice any words of comfort or encouragement, Jake dropped back to all fours and nuzzled the emaciated animal’s hind leg. The willpower required to keep from charging into the food must be staggering. Why was Deskins so afraid?
After what seemed like a long time, the stallion took a deep, shuddering breath, and twisted his head around to lip at Jake’s cheek. Then he shuffled inside and started attacking a large bin of grain. After a moment, Jake realized that he was rather hungry as well. Sighing, he found a half-filled bucket in the corner and joined Ardee in what might well be their last meal.
The sun came up while they ate, sending shafts of dusty sunlight through skylights and windows. After finishing the partial bucket of feed, Jake used his teeth to tear open a couple of bags. He trotted out a couple of times to suck water from a large plastic tub under the spigot, but Ardee was like a four-legged vacuum cleaner, consuming all the grain he could find without stopping.
Jake’s hunger abated after his third drink. The combination of a full belly and all the excitement of the previous day made his eyelids heavy, but he found himself shuffling back into the stall to get just one more mouthful of the grain. Only to come wide awake as Ardee squealed and jerked his head around to snap dangerously close to Jake’s face.
Scrambling back, Jake was shocked by the stallion’s pinned ears and wrinkled muzzle. Ardee’s nostrils flared, and after a few snuffles, the horse shook his head and visibly relaxed. Even so, Jake didn’t move until Deskins swung his head back to the grain and resumed eating.
Although he had been too busy eating to notice before, Jake realized that Ardee was bigger – a lot bigger. The stallion nearly filled the open part of the stall now, probably very close to reaching the target size and weight of his BodMod pattern. Unfortunately, it also seemed that Deskins’ mind was losing out to the implanted equine identity. Jake suddenly remembered Ardee’s reluctance to enter the stall in the first place. He must have known what would happen. Was there any of the man left inside at all?
All traces of Deskins would probably be gone in a matter of hours. He had done all he could to protect Jake’s life. There had to be some way to get help. Jake brayed in frustration. Escape was improbable, and it was even more unlikely that any rescue was in the works. Damn! Even if Ashland hadn’t disabled the computer, there was no way he could operate it by himself.
Jake suddenly snapped his head up. There was more in the office than just the computer! Trotting back to the door, he scanned the mess inside for a phone. The desk was clear except for some papers and scattered markers. Then he spotted it on the floor where Ardee must have knocked it off. Excited, Jake worked his way around to the device, and then sagged in disappointment.
A red light showed the phone was still connected, but its view screen had been crushed by one of Ardee’s hooves. No wonder Ashland hadn’t bothered to disconnect it. Without the audio-visual interface, the phone was useless. Then Jake’s ears perked up. Maybe not useless. He used a forehoof to right the device, and then lipped a pen between his teeth to poke at the large ‘End’ button. The red light turned green and a faint, tinny voice crackled from the shattered monitor. “Please state or enter the function desired.”
Jabbing at the number pad, he tried a number sequence. “I’m sorry. That is not a valid function.” Dammit! He tried again. What was it? 913? No, that had been the old area code. 911! He concentrated and carefully pushed the buttons
“Please state or select the nature of your emergency. Medical, Police, Fire, or Other.”
Jake squinted at the pad, trying to remember the right button. He hadn’t used manual input in years, and his vision just didn’t allow reading the characters. One was a reddish blur, and he jabbed at it.
“Fire Emergency. Connecting.” There was a short pause, and then another voice came through the static. “Fire Dispatch. Please activate your video.”
Jake dropped the pen and then brayed loudly at the monitor.
“What the…?” The man sounded annoyed. “You are on an Emergency Services communication line. If this is a prank, you have 2 seconds to disconnect before I take action!”
Braying again, Jake tried to think of some way to communicate. What was it they always did in the Vids? Morse Code! Except he didn’t know any damned Morse Code! Frantic, he tried grab the pen again.
“Tying up an Emergency line is a Federal offense.” There was a click, and the green light flickered out.
No! Dammit! Finding a marker, Jake pressed End and jabbed at the red button again. Only to jerk his head up as shouting reached his ears, angry and close by. He recognized Ashland’s voice, but not the others. Then came the gunshots.
Scrambling out of the office, Jake found Ardee already in the main aisle, his ears back and eyes showing white. Then an engine started and raced, followed by the sound of dirt and gravel spraying against the side of the barn. Then the main doors on the far end of the barn burst open as a white van crashed through. Its windshield shattered, and the vehicle weaved drunkenly, slamming into the stalls on the left side.
They both bolted for the opening, only to be brought up short by a wild-eyed old man who snarled and pointed a shotgun at them. “Fuckers!” Jake saw the barrel swing towards Ardee, and launched himself at the man without thinking. There was a flash of noise and pain just before he hit, and his right shoulder exploded in a spray of red.
Jake slammed into the old man hard enough to send the shotgun flying, but it was a glancing blow that ended up with him sprawled, stunned and bleeding, on the ground. Instead of grabbing his gun, the man shouted some familiar-sounding curses and staggered over to the van. He looked in and jerked the door open, then helped a white-haired black woman out. “It’s still set up. Come on! You know the sequences!”
Dazed, Jake watched the elderly couple run for the other end of the stable, turning to enter the stall next to Ardees’ - where the BodMod equipment had been left. After a moment, there were two anguished screams. Only the man emerged, his face contorted with rage. “Assholes!” He reached into a back pocket and then snicked open a long and deadly-looking switchblade. “Both you fuckers will wish you could die.”
“Drop it, Oscar.” All eyes turned to the side entrance, where Ashland stood holding her pistol on the old man. Her face was mass of purple and black bruises, and there was a blood-soaked rag tied around her left arm. She leaned against the wall and spat out a mouthful of blood. “You should watch your blood pressure. You’re not as young as you used to be.”
Oscar? Even through the haze of pain, Jake was able to recognize the Hispanic teen’s clothing. However, the man wearing them was a good 60 years older. Instead of dropping his knife, he turned and lunged for Ashland. She fired before he got two steps, blowing away a large chunk of his head. His body fell to the ground and twitched a few times.
Ashland remained where she was. “Come on out, Cindy.”
Jake found that he could move his foreleg again, the agony in his shoulder already fading to dull ache. As he rolled back up to all fours, the old woman shuffled slowly out of the stall.
“What’s the point?” Cindy was stooped and frail now, even older than Oscar. She looked down at the still form of her companion. “Roger has killed us already.” Then she shook her head and gave a wheezing laugh. “You think he isn’t going to get rid of you too, whore?”
“I wasn’t stupid enough to let a psycho like Roger create a BodMod for me.” Ashland worked her jaw. “You kicked me in the face when I was down. I should put a bullet in your head, too, but I’d rather just watch you… erk!” She jerked suddenly, eyes and mouth going wide, then dropped the gun and grabbed at her back. Then she dropped to her knees and did a face plant on the floor.
“Shoulda made sure I was dead, bitch.” There was no mistaking Denise, even as a punked-out octogenarian. She leaned against the wall next to Ashland and spit on her, then looked out into the stable. Her eyes flickered to the man’s motionless body. “Oscar?”
“The whore shot him in the head.” Cindy sank to the floor with a rattling cough. “We’re screwed.”
“Fuck that!” Denise lurched forward, heading for the equipment. “You know how to run the BodMod setup. There’s got to be a way to stop this!”
The computer hacker coughed again, then weakly gestured towards Jake and Deskins. “It’s all.. wrecked. They trashed it.” Her face twisted into a bitter sneer as the metal-studded psycho stopped at the stall door and stared in at Ardee’s revenge. “Worst part is that fucking Roger gets away with it all.”
Jake saw Denise look towards them, and brayed a warning to Ardee. Spinning, he bolted out the shattered doors and galloped for the road. He did not have to look back to see if the draft was following – he could felt the ground shaking. There was no way Denise could catch them now! Then his gut twisted as he heard the van’s engine roar back to life.
Forcing his pumping legs to work even faster, Jake charged down the long dirt driveway. The white fencing on either side looked sturdy, with slats too close together for him to try squeezing through. Ardee could probably break through easily with his new bulk, but it was unlikely that the stallion would think of that.
He heard the van crash out of the stable, tires throwing dirt and gravel as it careened towards them. The battered vehicle skidded into the fence, ripping out a long section on one side and then swerving across the driveway and smashing through the opposite barrier and slamming into a tree, setting off the horn.
Both of the fleeing equines stopped near the far end of the driveway and looked back. There was no movement from the van at all. Shaken, Jake sagged and leaned against one of Ardee’s thick forelegs. After a moment, the horse dropped his head and snuffled, then lipped gently at Jake’s neck. The van’s horn continued to wail for a few minutes, then faltered, becoming a low buzzing.
Jake heard the crunch of gravel, and turned to see a fancy SUV pulling in from the road. The driver must have seen the accident. He sighed. Whoever it was would be in for an even bigger shock when they saw… Teeth suddenly clamped down hard on his neck, and it felt like his head was being wrenched off as Ardee literally flung him back down the driveway. Jake hit the dirt and slammed into one of the fence posts just as the stallion’s squeal of rage ended with a sickening thud of metal and glass against flesh.
Amazed to find that he could still move, Jake looked back and saw Ardee thrashing weakly on the ground. The SUV was crumpled halfway back to the windshield, yet he could hear the driver trying to restart the steaming engine. His first attempt to rise was short-circuited by hot pain in his chest. Broken ribs, probably, if not more serious injuries. Doing his best to ignore the agony, Jake struggled up to all fours.
The driver threw open his door and stepped out. Jake blinked, recognizing the thin, balding Asian man as a fellow Portal employee. A programmer, whose name he couldn’t quite remember until he noted the man’s baggy, disheveled clothing and the Mickey Mouse watch on his wrist. Roger.
There was only one way to run. Jake stumbled back towards the stable, coughing up blood. Looking back, he saw Roger glance down at the shattered stallion and then heft a large pistol and stride after him.
It took longer than before for the nanites to work their miracles, but by the time Jake reached the barn his breathing had improved. He was brought up short by the strong stink of decay. Cindy had joined Oscar as a rotting corpse, both bodies disintegrating the same way the BodMod suit had. Breathing through his mouth, Jake headed for the side door – and discovered that it was shut.
He brayed in frustration and turned to run back out the front, but Roger was already there. The man looked at the decaying remains of his former conspirators and smiled grimly. “That’s three. Now, where is our little dominatrix?” Jake backed away from the side entrance, revealing Ashland’s still form. “Good. Denise was obviously better with a knife than a van. Saves me the trouble of killing her myself. Which just leaves me with one problem.” His eyes narrowed. “You.”
Jake moved deeper into the stable, his mind racing. If he could make it to the office, maybe he could … what? The door was already weakened, and it was hardly bulletproof. He ended up against the training arena door, ears pinned back.
“Your buddy out there was smarter than I thought.” Roger walked slowly between the stalls. “I got in fine. Everything was according to plan. And then it all went to shit. Seems that somebody triggered a hidden code that locked all of Portal’s assets to manual passwords. There was a major panic, and everyone came running to the only man who could have done it.” He gave a short laugh. “Me.”
“It took two years of planning and every penny I had to become Deskins, and he made it all useless! But not without help.” Squatting by Ashland, the man yanked out Denise’s knife and hefted it. “A bullet in the heart will take you down. And I’ll make sure you’re conscious when I start hacking your head off. It’s the least I can do to repay you. Then I’ll finish off Ardee.” He aimed the weapon at Jake’s chest. “See you in Hell.”
“You first.”
They both turned to see Ashland still on the ground, but using both hands to point her pistol at Roger. She fired twice as he brought his weapon around. The impact knocked him backwards, and he landed face up on the ground in front of Jake. He looked up with a bewildered expression, hands twitching and mouth working silently. Then his eyes drifted and he lay still.
“Don’t worry.” Ashland coughed and pushed her self up slowly. “He must have chucked the BodMod on the way here. Any nanites in his system are inactive. He’s dead.” She managed a slight smile. “Good thing I’m wearing mine.”
Jake heard sirens approaching in the distance, and suddenly felt renewed fear. There was only one witness left who could communicate. The woman heard them too, sighing as she eased into a sitting position. “Well, shit.” She looked at him, hefted her pistol, then sighed and dropped it on the ground. “We need to talk.”
The new stable wasn’t as big overall, but its individual accommodations would have rated five stars on the equine scale. Both Jake and Ardee had large, spacious stalls with openings to a fifty-acre pasture. Ironically, Jake’s was the one with a wide-screen Vid and customized computer system. The man who had paid for all of this seemed quite content with regular feeding and the attention of their ‘owner.’
By all rights, Ashland should have gone to jail for life. However, as she had carefully pointed out as the emergency vehicles searched for a way to get around the wrecked SUV, no one else knew who Ardee and Jake really were. Her proposition was simple, however, and made sense. So when the first police officer came running into the barn, he was already in a stall with his face down in a grain bucket.
According to her and follow-up stories on the news, the world believed that Rupert Deskins had been kidnapped and murdered by a group of kidnappers led by a disgruntled employee named Roger Shinko. Ashland Moore, a ‘close friend’ of Deskins’ who had also been kidnapped, shot the leader in self defense after he attacked her with a knife. If she hadn’t been wearing a BodMod to heal injuries from a recent riding accident, she would been killed as well. The rest had died when their hacked BodMod disguises malfunctioned. Deskin’s body was never found. And Jake’s disappearance never even made the news at all.
He snorted and looked out into the pasture, where Ardee was rolling in patch of dusty earth. Although he had adopted a fully equine pattern of behavior, the former human’s continued fondness for Jake was evidence that at least some small part of Deskins remained. And he seemed truly happy as a horse, strutting proudly in the elaborate tack Ashland dressed him in for shows. Ardee also did not seem to mind the other activities that went with being a stallion, activities which actually more than paid for both their upkeep.
That left the entire allotment for Ashland to spend on herself. However, she was also a prisoner of sorts. No one else could see Jake, which meant she had to care and feed for both of them every day. Luckily, his hooves never needed trimming, and he was apparently immune to the various maladies that equine usually suffered. In fact, until the nanites wore out or the program was completed, he was essentially immortal.
Jake sighed. Spending eternity as a freak did not appeal to him, but in truth, he found this new life to be an improvement over his human existence. He was comfortable, pampered even, and the big draft horse wasn’t the only one performing stud services. If he got tired of it, there was always the facial overlay. Ashland had it somewhere, along with the code to activate it. He knew she had planned to use it on him after claiming the first allotment, but their uneasy truce had developed into a grudging codependence. And for all her faults, she was a conscientious and caring owner for both her equine charges.
A loud whinny came from the pasture, and he saw Ardee kick up his heels and look towards Jake expectantly. Grinning to himself, Jake nosed the oversized button that turned off his computer. The boss wanted to play.
end
