Squirming Coil - Part Four of Six

It had been a long time since Ezmerel had dreamed, too long ago to remember. No one dreamed anymore. The Empire put things in the food to neutralize such rebellious behavior. Tonight Ezmerel slept with a belly full of fresh, Einsteinian food.

Ezmerel dreamed.

Anger. Running. Running so fast, so far. ANGER. The horizon suddenly rising up, a tsunami of earth rolling, blocking out the sun. Nowhere to run. Turn back. RUN. Fear. Not gonna make it. RUN. The whole Earth shakes, falls from the sky. Buried. Darkness fear fear fear fear…

He awoke screaming, kicking wildly at the thin sheet covering him. A hand grabbed his shoulder. Screaming all the louder he jumped from the bed, the sheet tangled around his legs and he fell on his face. This was the first time in over ten years that Ezmerel had awakened feeling anything but beaten. The anger Dr. Vonnegut had brought out in him the night before still flooded his mind. Once loose from the sheet he was quickly on his feet, ready to thrash the intruder in his bed. Sheila sat there watching him, wearing nothing but one of his shirts.

"What are you doing here?" Ezmerel growled. His anger raging, but a tone of embarrassment slipping in.

"I thought I’d stay with you for the night," Sheila replied innocently. "You were in pretty bad shape, and besides, I’m supposed to be filling in for your wife." She smiled sheepishly.

"My wife never…" Ezmerel began, but then he noticed his hands. The bandages were wrapped expertly, but rather thick. Some red blotches still rose to the surface. "Oh no," he said, anger already wiped out by the usual fear. "I can’t work like this, Sheila. What am I going to do?"

She stared at him blankly and asked, "Can’t you take a sick day?"

Ezmerel laughed out loud, his body jerking nervously. He shook his head at her as if she had just spoken in tongues and paced across the room. He needed to think. He knew people had taken days off and returned to the Counter’s Office, but what kind of excuse did it take? It was well known that unexcused absences from your assigned position would automatically put you up for Review.

"I need a reason, Sheila," he said, continuing to pace along the foot of the bed, rubbing his enlarged hands together. "I need a good reason, and a truthful one, or they’ll take me for Review. That would be my third. No one comes back from their third."

"What kind of reason?" she asked.

"I don’t know!" Ezmerel yelled, his emotions fluctuating violently. "I have no idea. I feel so lost. Dr. Vonnegut did something to me, to my head last night. My mind is spinning. AHH!" He kicked the wall, breaking his big toe with an audible pop. He screamed like a dieing predator.

"Calm down," Sheila demanded. "You’re going to alarm the neighbors. You have two hours before the Awakening Bell. Let me make a call and I’ll figure this out."

"No, no calls," Ezmerel said. "They’re monitored."

"I know," she said, "don’t worry. I have a phone that feeds directly to a satellite on the Einstein. The Empire won’t hear a thing."

She climbed out of bed and Ezmerel froze in mid stride. The shirt she borrowed from him was short enough to expose more of her legs than he thought possible. When she turned toward the door he could see the slight outward curve of the very beginnings of her perfectly rounded ass. His mind had finally found something to focus on. He stumbled toward her a couple of steps and she turned around. The look on his face made her giggle guiltily.

"I’ve gotten some looks in my day, but that is the best ever," she said, spinning on her toes, making the shirt float up just a bit. "You wait here and I’ll take care of everything." She spun out of sight with a wink and Ezmerel stared at the empty doorway, jaw agape.

Ezmerel was sitting on the bed when Sheila came back. His face was level with the shirt hem. She glided up to him slowly and put her hands on his shoulders. He could smell her, a sweet, salty, fresh fragrance that closed his eyes with pleasure.

"You’re shaking," she whispered, her hands massaging gently. "You don’t need to worry, Ezmerel. I’m going to take care of you." She slowly knelt before him, running her hands down his chest and stomach and onto his thighs. She stared deep into his wild eyes as she had stared into them the first time he saw her. "All we have to tell them is that you slipped in the bathroom and fell into the mirror. It is almost completely true, all the evidence is there. They’ll believe it." She caressed his inner thighs with her fingertips. "But before we do anything else, we need to make you relax."

Ezmerel’s mouth moved as if to speak, but no sounds came out. His entire body tingled. Sheila pulled gently at Ezmerel’s pants until Ezmerel’s engorged, virgin member sprang out. She took him into her mouth, making him moan instantly and continuously until he fell back on the bed spasming and flailing through a violent orgasm.

Ezmerel dreamed.

Darkness, crushing. No fear. Digging. Rising up. No fear. Light. A break in the dark surrounding. Rising up, no fear. The sun setting, most amazing, most colorful. A giant spiraling light lowering gently from the horizon, falling up. Flying through the spiral. Rising up, no fear. FREE.

He woke with a smile to a gentle shaking.

"Wake up," Sheila cooed gently. "Wake up, Ezmerel."

He opened his eyes slowly. She appeared as an angel above him.

"I just had a wonderful dream," he said.

"That’s good," she whispered with a giggle, "but you need to get up now. An Inspector will be here shortly."

He jolted upright. "Here?" he asked. "They’re coming here?"

"It’s OK," she said, squeezing his arm gently. "I called and told them our story. It’s just procedure for them to send someone out to make sure everything lines up. Just remember, you got out of the shower last night, slipped on your wet feet, and when you threw your hands out to stop the fall they crashed through the mirror."

"I don’t know," Ezmerel said.

"Just let me do the talking," Sheila said, pulling Ezmerel on to his feet, chest to chest. "If they ask you any questions just answer them as simply as possible. You’ll do just fine."

Ezmerel did not argue. He found himself suddenly believing that she could never be wrong, that all he need do is follow her every whim and he would be fine. Sheila had rebandaged his hands while he slept, freeing his fingers a bit, and he was able to button his own shirt.

"Maybe I could work like this," Ezmerel said.

"Not a chance," Sheila said, pulling pants on under his shirt. "You would never get through the day without making an error. It’s better to risk it this way, it gives you a much better chance."

"OK," Ezmerel said, "you’re right."

They walked hand-in-hand to the living room to await the Inspector.

The door slid away from the wall. Ezmerel stood stoically in the lengthening spotlight of early morning sun, a single thought repeating – believe, and he did.

The Inspector was dressed in a uniform very similar to the common black and gray of the police, except for the bright white stripe running down the inside of each arm and the red cross on his hat. He marched confidently up the door and extended a hand to Ezmerel.

"Ezmerel Cantone?" he asked.

Ezmerel eyed the outstretched hand, held up his own bandaged appendage, and shrugged sanguinely. The Inspector pushed past him and disappeared into the bathroom. It was all Ezmerel could do not to burst out laughing. A day ago he would have broken down with fear at the sight of that uniform entering his home, but today, after Dr. Vonnegut’s cruel spells and Sheila’s delicious magic, he surged with a confidence too powerful to take. He longed to step over the ever-approaching line into madness once and for all. The smile he had been holding back fought it’s way to the surface and he turned to Sheila with a toothy grin. She slapped him briskly on the side of the neck, making him jump with surprise.

"You’re injured," she whispered and squeezed his left hand, sending a burst of pain up through his arm. "Remember?"

The assault brought Ezmerel back to the world long enough to remember the seriousness of the situation. He took a deep breath and his strength was gone again. The Inspector came out of the bathroom wearing a smirk of his own.

"I’ll need to ask your wife a few questions, Mr. Cantone," the Inspector said. "Do you think you could get me a cup of coffee?"

Ezmerel shook his head and mumbled incoherently. He had no idea how to respond, he had never even had a cup of coffee. The Inspector stopped and looked down at his clipboard.

"Oh, never mind," he said. "I don’t suppose a Counter would have coffee so easily available. Well, wait in the kitchen while I talk to your wife, would you?"

Ezmerel did not look up from the floor as he left the room, keeping his fisted hands and quickly whitening knuckles jammed in the pockets of his robe. His bare feet swished against the cold floor as he paced the kitchen. Why couldn’t they just tell him what they wanted him to do? If they would take him away from here, out from the shadow of the Empire as he had been told, he would do anything. Without the fear and self-pity he had hidden under all these years he could smell the freedom that awaited him. The idea of subjecting himself to further inquisition was unbearable. Sheila appeared in the doorway a few minutes later, her face a blank slate but her eyes filling with doubt when she looked into Ezmerel’s.

"He’ll speak with you now," she said softly.

Ezmerel nodded and winked at her as he swept by. He found the Inspector lounging comfortably on the couch, patting the cushion next to him. The friendly smirk was still on the man’s lips, but Ezmerel could see a fire burning in his eyes. Had Sheila slipped up somehow? Impossible. Maybe he knew whom the weak one was. Ezmerel could only imagine the information available in his file. The Empire, and therefore this Inspector, knew things about him he no longer knew. He sat, heart pounding.

"Let me see your hands," the Inspector said, barely speaking above a whisper.

Ezmerel held out his hands and watched the bandages pulled awkwardly away. The Inspector glanced at the lacerations on the back of the right hand then frowned at the oozing gashes along both sides of both thumbs.

"Well," the Inspector groaned, releasing Ezmerel’s left hand and holding the right with both of his own. "The wounds on the back of your hand are consistent enough with your wife’s story. You even still have a little splinter of mirror in there."

Ezmerel winced and cooed with pain as the Inspector pinched the back of his hand and yanked a barely visible, glimmering sliver from one of the wounds. Before he could recover, the Inspector grabbed him by both thumbs and squeezed. This time Ezmerel cried out. His eyes slammed shut and fear welled from the bottom of his mind.

"But these are different," the Inspector continued without hesitation, opening his hands and presenting Ezmerel’s thumbs. "These look like bite marks, Ezmerel. Now, how does one get bite marks putting his hands through a mirror?"

"Those happened after," Ezmerel groaned, unable to look up from the floor.

"Your wife said nothing about a second incident," the Inspector said.

"Just after I slipped… I was angry and… not myself, I…"

"You keep secrets from your wife, Ezmerel?"

"What?"

"I said, do you keep secrets from your wife?" the Inspector said, still staring at Ezmerel’s downturned eyes.

"NO! How could you ask that?"

"Then why didn’t she know about these?" the Inspector said, squeezing Ezmerel’s thumbs again.

"I didn’t think to tell her, that’s all," Ezmerel pleaded through clenched teeth.

"Secrets can destroy a family, Ezmerel," the Inspector said, loosening his grip. "All of us within the Empire are a family. Keeping secrets is treason against your family, against the Empire."

"I keep no secrets."

"You’ve been known to in the past," the Inspector said. "That’s why we gave you this." He slapped Ezmerel hard on the back of the neck. "You remember, don’t you? You want us to turn it back on?"

"I keep no secrets," Ezmerel said again, trying to convince himself.

"So you tell your wife everything?"

"Yes."

"Do you beat her, too?"

"What?"

"Do you beat your wife, Ezmerel?" the Inspector said, his smirk widening just a bit.

"Of course not," Ezmerel said. "I’m the one with the injury."

"Yes," the Inspector said. He lifted Ezmerel’s hands for further inspection. "But maybe it wasn’t the accident you say. All the evidence shows that your hands were fisted when they struck the mirror. Your wounds and the shape of the fragments make that obvious."

"What are you saying?" Ezmerel asked, truly confused.

"You have a lot of anger in you, Ezmerel," the Inspector said. "Also why we gave you this." He again slapped the back of Ezmerel’s neck, this time gripping it and pulling Ezmerel’s face very close to his own. "We know you too well, Ezmerel. I can see you are angry about something."

"I have no anger, anymore," Ezmerel said, finally able to look into the man’s eyes. The statement felt true. This man’s dark magic had undone all of Dr. Vonnegut’s and Sheila’s work. His fear was in control again. "I am but a servant of the Empire, sir. I just need my hands to heal a bit before returning to work."

The Inspector released Ezmerel’s neck and punched him hard in the right eye. "My investigation is complete," he said, standing quickly and moving to the door. "Do not leave your home for the remainder of the day. Report to work tomorrow barring further instruction." He pulled the door lever and disappeared through the portal before the door hit the ground.