Michael’s internal investigative work was interrupted by a polite cough. He opened his eyes, turned his head and found himself looking into the torso of a man dressed in black. Michael craned his head far enough to catch sight of a black polo neck sweater reaching almost to the edges of a neatly trimmed full black beard. The man’s hair had been dragged back and tied back into a rough, short pony tail. He was a dark thundercloud heralding the storm to come and Michael felt a wave of something chilling pass across his mental landscape. The presence, perhaps an aura, gave him the feeling of having moved in close and danced with arcane powers, something more than a casual flirtation with darker and more occult worlds than Michael’s surfer’s brain wanted to acknowledge.
The man clearly saw Michael’s fearful reaction. He held a gloved finger to his lips, “Shhh, you dont need to be calling for help now.” The man’s leather gloves looked expensive and well worn. Perhaps Italian, as would befit a man as darkly coloured as he was. He wore a ring on one finger, above the glove, as though the gloves themselves were a second skin. Michael scanned downward, suddenly very tired at trying to hold his head at such an awkward angle. The black polo shirt lead down to black jeans, a leather belt sporting a silver buckle that picked up on the styling of the ring that he wore. His long black trenchcoat was cut to expensive lines. The man represented money, taste and carried himself as one aquainted with power yet subservient to it.
“Who the hell are you?” Michael demanded, the words sounding weaker than he wanted them to be, more a petulent child than master of his own fate.
The man laughed softly. He reached down and brushed Michael’s dreadlocks back out of his face. A creepy, unsettling gesture. One that sent Michael’s mind screaming back into the dark recesses looking for a place to escape. The strange gentleness only reminded him of his own utter powerlessness. Not to mention his sexuality screaming at the concept of another man touching him with the tenderness and in a way that he’d known female lovers to in the past. He didnt count himself homophobic per-se, but there was a note of violation in the touch, in the look the man was giving him, the half smile. He knew he was deliberately stepping across taboo boundaries and making Michael uncomfortable at a time when he was in no place to turn aside any such advances. There was nothing violent in the gesture but it served to prove to Michael that should the man choose to, he’d be powerless to resist or deflect anything he chose to do.
“You know how ineffective it would be to cry out right now?” the man asked.
The man leaned down close, “My name is Nottingham, Ian Nottingham. A name you will no doubt recall for the rest of your earthly existance.”
Nottingham stepped back from the bed, “I’m here to deliver a message, an offer if you will.” He started walking and slipped out of Michael’s peripheral vision. It sounded like he had picked up a clipboard from the end of the bed and was leafing through the pages. The clipboard was returned and his soft, barely audible footsteps moved around the other side of the bed. Michael turned his head to watch as Nottingham leaned down and ran gloved fingers across hospital equipment that trailed wires in Michael’s direction. Nottingham straightened and fingertips traced an IV line upward to a bag containing clear liquid.
“I could end your suffering you know.” he said quietly. Nottingham looked down and made brief eye contact with Michael. There seemed to be an unspoken communication, something genuine. Michael frowned and remembered when his Father had used similar language, when he left to take the family dog for a walk and returned home alone.
Nottingham paused log enough to register Michael’s silence as declining the offer.
“The message I am here to convey is simple. As designated representative of your current employer. I have it within my power to grant you almost full mobility albeit with a few minor … boundaries.”
Michael turned the words over in his mind. There was something slippery about them. Something didnt add up.
“Go to hell!” he said.
Nottingham smiled, slipped his hand into the pocket of his jacket and produced a syringe, “See now Michael, there’s something distinctly biblical about this moment. Moses spoke to the nation of Israel, told them ‘see, I set before you life and death. I urge you to choose life’” as he was speaking he twirled the syringe up and down around his figers, moving it deftly, a magician practicing manual dexterity exercised before the real trick began.
“Life and death Michael. You’ll never walk again, but I can offer you the ocean, and the ability to swim. And as a foretaste … ” Nottingham reached for the bag of liquid and injected it with the couple of CC’s in the syringe. There was a cloudiness around the injection point which quickly dispersed. Moments later Michael felt a dreadful tingling itch at his shoulder, spreading to his shoulder blades and upper back, then down his arms. Sensation returned and introduced him to a whole new world of hurt.
“I’ve given you your upper body back, and we can give you your legs, at least when you’re in the water. What do you say, hmm?” Nottingham stepped back away from the IV, toward the end of the bed, “That’ll be a ‘yes’ then I take it. Good…”
Michael wimpered in pain realizing that the hospital had chemically numbed him for a reason. He wasnt paralysed from the neck down at all. He’d simply been disconnected from the pain and spared the agony of recovery. He turned to address Nottingham and his back erupted into a white hot fire of pain. Michael’s world was reduced to a few square inches of his body. He fell back onto the pillow and cursed the world not knowing or caring if Nottingham had left the room.
Ian Nottingham stalked down the hallway and out into the night. He pulled a sat-phone from his pocket, dialed and spoke quickly, “Thailand is secure. I assume all has been prepared locally?” he paused, then spoke again, “yes. I’ll be in touch when its done.”