The Taulier entered the room. The Count and Bond were waiting for him at the table. He listened to what they had to say.
“Well, that’s not much.”
“It is not.”
“What do we do now?”
Bond looked at Id. Then he looked at the Count and then back at Id. The Count closed his mouth in a contrived smile and raised his eyebrows. He didn’t agree with what his friend had in mind, but he saw no other option. The Taulier interjected.
“It’s out of the question! We lost Dreamz that way, there’s no chance in hell I’m going to risk losing you too. I know what you’re going to say. Yes, you’re more powerful and experienced than Dreamz, but you’ve also spent the last few months in an imaginary world trying to forget who you are. How long did that thing last for you, exactly? Decades, you told me. And you think you’re in perfect shape now to probe a mind that’s most likely compromised? Have you even fully recovered all of your abilities? Need I remind you that less than an hour ago, Goulu managed to eject you from his mind? Goulu of all people!”
“I was going easy on him.” Bond defended himself. “You don’t want me to torture him any more than he already has, do you? Besides, I don’t think he locked the memory himself. I mean, with all due respect to him, his mind is too weak to even consider that as a possibility. We need to find out who did it and why.”
“I don’t want you to get into his mind any more forcefully than you already have. And as far as Angel’s mind is concerned, that’s a hard no. First of all, we have never fully understood what happened to him when he had his accident. His brain and body fully recovered years ago. His vegetative state is due to something else. And as for the incident from two weeks ago, even if you could safely dig through that memory, do you think you could find anything more?”
“We all saw the video. He was not talking to a stranger. If he knew who that was, we probably do too. I mean, didn’t you assign this mission to us because we are the most capable of finding all this out?”
“Sorry, Bond. It’s too risky. I can’t allow it,” the Taulier insisted.
The Count had to jump in, he didn’t want this to become more of an argument than it already was.
“Bond, Mr. Id is right and you know it, so enough with the ‘I don’t care, I’m going to do it anyway’ look.”
“Okay, okay. If you don’t want me to, I won’t. I promise.”
The three men were silent for a minute, looking at each other, trying to come up with an alternative.
Bond spoke again:
“Okay, I won’t do it, but… He could…”
“What? He? You mean… the other guy?”
“Himself.”
“You can’t be serious?”
“Bond. My friend… you are losing your mind again. Are you even on speaking terms? I thought you weren’t.”
“Well, we’ll see. I have a feeling he won’t be able to resist my offer.”
“I’m not sure I want to know,” the Count added. “Are you sure we cannot do without him?”
“I can’t go to the spirit world anymore. He still can.”
“And why would we want to go to the spirit world now?” objected the Taulier.
“If we can’t safely enter Angel’s mind and find out what happened, then one of them can.” Bond replied. “And if they’re in the mood to tell us, they may even already know what happened in that room.”
“They won’t do it for free. What will it cost you? And I don’t even want to think about the consequences of releasing him. Have you forgotten why he‘s locked up? He almost destroyed you.”
“Either I go into Guardian Angel’s mind, or we let him do his thing.” Bond pushed the chair back and crossed his arms. “Believe me, I have thought this through. I don’t see any other option. Do you? Besides, if the situation is as bad as you say, Taulier, if all the agents had to be reactivated, we might have to release him too at some point.”
The Count said nothing. He just looked up and sighed. Despite everything, the Count and Mr. Id were rarely angry with Bond. That often annoyed other members of the Organization. Many of them thought Bond got too many free passes for his antics. They would have felt vindicated at that very moment. Especially if they could have seen the look on the Taulier’s face.
“Don’t say another word! Just don’t.”
The three men fell silent again. Mr. Id had a hard time thinking clearly, he had to calm down first. The Count almost laughed. You know when a situation is so ridiculous that all you can do is laugh? This was it. Bond was just waiting for them to come to their senses. And by “come to their senses” he meant “allow him to do something utterly senseless“. The standoff lasted longer than it should have, provided its conclusion was foregone. The Taulier looked Bond straight in the eye. He shook his head and looked down. He looked up again.
“Don’t make me regret this, Bond. You’re not going to make me regret this, are you? If you make me regret this, I swear I’ll…” the Taulier couldn’t finish his sentence.
Under almost any other circumstances, Bond would have put on his insufferable “victory smirk,” as the Count called it. This time he understood that the situation didn’t call for it. Was Bond getting wiser? Or was it just that he didn’t want to deal with the other guy either, but he knew he had to, that it couldn’t be put off any longer? The Count was torn between “I thought we were going all in, so yeah, let’s go all in” and not wanting to possibly lose his best friend and favorite teammate so soon after being reunited, or at all.
“What do you need?” the Taulier finally asked.
“Not much. Most of it is in my bag. A bottle of bourbon would be nice.”
The Taulier pressed the button of an intercom on the table.
“Please get Bond’s traveling bag and…” he turned to Bond. “What kind of bourbon?”
“I have no idea. I know nothing about bourbon. It’s his poison, not mine.”
“And a bottle of bourbon, the cheapest you’ll find in the bar. Draco probably left a bottle there last night.” Taulier finished into the microphone.
“Thank you, Taulier. I appreciate it. Okay, I have to start preparing for this. I don’t want to waste any more of your time.”
“I don’t like this.”
“I know.”
Before leaving the room, the Taulier added. “And the room is under video surveillance in case anything happens.”
Bond nodded. He had already stopped listening. The Taulier left the room without another word. The Count had the forced smile he usually has when he disagrees with Bond, but he knows it won’t change anything.
“What do you want me to do?” he asked.
“I don’t know if he’ll be happy to see you. If you haven’t quit smoking, I think it’s a good time for you to go outside and burn one. Have you quit?”
“I almost did, but I’m afraid that’s out the window now, probably until this story is over. If we survive it. Good luck with him. I guess I’ll be back in an hour or so. Will that be enough?”
“It should be fine.”
“Okay. Good luck.”
They smiled at each other. The Count left the room as a clone entered carrying Bond’s bag.
End of Chapter 3
(to be continued in Chapter 4)
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Author(s)
Frenchman, exiled on the other side of the planet, DavidB writes. It's not always very good, but who cares, the goal is to write. Sometimes, he also does other things.
MetaStructure is one of his longest-running projects. It was started in the early 2000s. Stopped many times. Started over a few times. Let's hope this time is the right one.
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