ANDERS MAGE PAGE 2.0

Walters listened to the tapping on the milk glass of his door. He sat brooding in the darkness of his office, regarding a bottle of Jim Beam. The minimal light giving it a soft amber gleam.

"Who is it?"

"It's Jenkins sir. I was wondering if I could have a word with you."

Ah, well, he thought. Best to get this over with. "Come on in."

Jenkins took in the office with the practiced eye of a veteran, even as he let himself in in a manner that would let Walters think he didn't want to disturb him. Walters found himself admiring the kid for his professionalism.

"What can I do for you, Jenkins? Sit down. Make yourself comfy."

"Well, sir. Some of the other operatives... I don't quite know how to phrase this."

"Spit it out, son. And I'll see if I can't put it together."

"Well, it's about your drinking, sir."

"Yeah. So."

"Well... It's just that some of the operatives... Feel that you might benefit from some counseling. They think you might jeopardize a mission or... something."

"Re-education you mean."

Jenkins looked down at his shoes. "I don't think that it will actually come to that. I really don't think that is necessary. I'm just thinking of the good of the team. That's all."

Finally, the day had come that Walters had prayed for — and yet he couldn't help but feel bitterness.

"Let me ask you a question Jenkins. Do you believe in the Technocratic Dream?"

"Well, sure. I mean... Don't you?"

"A quiet normal life. Free from outside influences. Safe and cozy... It's the biggest crock of shit in the world."

Jenkins started swiveling his head from side to side, looking around the room. "Really sir, you shouldn't say such things out loud. Someone could be listening."

"Drop the act, Jenkins. I've known for weeks that you're a spy sent to test my loyalty."

"Sir, I'm afraid I... I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh please. Don't insult me. I wrangled a look at your dossier. Your real dossier."

Jenkins face hardened. His scared rabbit demeanor dropped away like a heavy coat. "What gave me away exactly?"

"Little things, tradecraft stuff that no rookie could have known. I'll give you this. You're good."

"So what happens now?" Jenkins said as he shifted to be ready to dive.

Walters smiled. "Relax, Jenkins. If I felt threatened by you, you would have 'disappeared' days ago." He poured himself another. "As a matter of fact, I feel at peace for the first time in a while."

"Why? If you don't mind me asking. You've done things and said things just now that violate political orthodoxy. I'm perfectly within my rights to have you relieved of command and re-educated. Thoroughly."

"Well, I'd hope so. I'm counting on it, as a matter of fact."

"What?"

"Let me tell you a story."

"Sir, I don't think..."

"Relax Jenkins. My problems aren't going anywhere."

Jenkins got a distinct look of discomfort. Walters had to smile. Perhaps he thinks I'm testing him.

"When I was younger, and an up and coming black suit like yourself, I was sent on an assignment that took me to the Detroit field office. You ever work that office, Jenkins?"

"No, sir."

"Lot of violent activity in that city. Holds more angry vampires and Euthanatos than any other I've been in. It's real easy to burn out in that city. Anyway, I'm working a case that takes me there, chasing some Marauder maniac."

"Doktor Klaw."

"So you've read my file."

"Parts of it."

"Well, then you know that I finally managed to return to the Construct after subduing him, and was immediately sent out to deal with a reality crisis that all the operatives were being sent to contain."

"The Los Cruzados incident."

"You know it?"

"A battle between a Euthanatos Chantry and a large group of Operatives that ended in a reality storm three city blocks wide."

"You make it sound like a historical event instead of a paradigmic holocaust. I remember when the fighting broke down into house-to-house combats. I was chasing this girl who kept making me dive for cover from gunfire. I had cornered her in an alley and was about to neutralize her when I felt this rumble in my viscera. I looked up and noticed that the sky had turned red."

"The storm."

"Yes, and that was the last thing I remember until I woke up in Lathropsberg."

"Lathropsberg?"

"Yeah. It was like a town that time forgot. Norman Rockwell was probably born there. A little podunk town in the middle of nowhere, looking like it was straight out of the 1950's. I wandered into town,addled from the storm. Fortunately, Sheriff Tyler spotted me and steered me to Doc Hankins. I was a little out of sorts, you see."

"According to your files, you were missing for five years. You chalked it up to hysterical amnesia."

"Who's telling this story?"

"Sorry. What happened next?"

"After I had recovered, I became convinced that I had slipped out of time somehow. Lathropsberg had phones and radios but no T.V.'s and there really wasn't anything to do in town except go to an ice cream social or root for the Bearcats."

"Bearcats?"

"Local high school football team. Our arch enemies were the Morris High Panthers. But I'll be damned if we ever played an away game."

"What are you saying?"

"What I'm saying is that I got on the train once to explore the outlying areas and as we left town and chugged out into the country I fell asleep. When I awoke we were pulling back into town and I remember being so happy and relieved to be home."

"You were trapped in a Paradox realm."

"Bingo."

"Is that what this is about? Some sort of incipient paraphobia?"

"Oh no. It goes much deeper than that. You see, it was paradise."

"What?"

"From the Technocratic standpoint, it was exactly that. It took me a while to adjust because I was so used to conflict and the Ascencion War. I told them that I was something of a lawman back home. But Sheriff Tyler told me that there was barely enough work for his deputy Benny. When I told them that I knew something about technical matters they got me a job in a hardware store where I spent a lot of time just chewing the fat with a bunch of friendly old geezers. I went looking for supernatural threats to the tranquility of the town and found none. This town didn't even have a seemy side. There weren't any outcasts or town drunks or troublemakers or anything. It was incredibly dull."

"I'm having trouble imagining it."

"I went a little crazy there for a while. I kept trying to escape and in the process discovered a weird little fact about the town. Everyone in it had a sort of low level empathy and as I went crazier I could feel the pressure of their minds on me. There was this urge to conformity that was breaking into my thoughts all the time."

"But you finally escaped."

"No... No, I didn't." Walters stopped for a moment and swallowed the whiskey.

"Eventually, their pressure wore me down. I started to forget my old life. I began to forget details and then large chunks. They Made me. There are still portions of my life before that I can't recall exactly. As I began to conform to the community, they referred to my attempts to escape as my "muddled time." I was paired off with a woman at an ice cream social. We married. We raised a child. I worked at the hardware store. I lived the quiet, normal life. Free from distractions. I lived the technocratic dream."

"Well, then. How did you escape?"

"A group of Operatives and Iteration X men showed up in town. They seemed to sense that I was one of them. For my part, it shocked loose some of my old thinking and we escaped together."

"Well then I don't see what the problem is."

"You goddamned idiot! The problem is... I never really escaped. Every time things get bad I can see that accursed town in my mind. I know it's still there, but I can't bring myself to risk trying to return.

"Why would you want to, if it was so boring?"

"Because it was everything that I had ever sought all my life. Everything that I was ever told to seek. It was the technocratic dream. A dull, stultifying, repetitive sameness. That you eventually can't live without."

Walters continued. "I'm not the only person who has been there. I've seen the case files of nearly every technomancer that has ever spent an appreciable amount of time there, and without exception each and every one of them has either turned to nephandism or committed suicide."

"Well then why aren't we warned about it?"

"You can't exactly warn the foot soldiers that paradise will destroy them. So when you say that you've come to take me away to rearrange my mental furniture, I can only say 'thank God'. Because I've been trying to forget that cursed place for three years now." Walters picked up the bottle. "And this just isn't doing it anymore."