Truth and Consequences II
Robert Smith was washing his hands when the doorbell rang.
The bear finished quicker than he would have liked and walked to the door, opening it to find a package. A private courier had delivered it and he was driving away as Smith picked it up. It was surprisingly heavy, which worried the bear. Upon taking it inside and slicing the single length of tape that sealed it with a butter knife, he found two rocks, a very old cell phone, and one pristine sealed envelope.
Dreading what he was about to find in the envelope, he opened it with the butter knife and read the contents, which consisted of erratic, crossed out but finely printed handwriting. There were doodles along the margins, spirals and twists and swirling shapes.
"Mister S" darkened scribbles of ink covered the next dozen letters, though Smith was sure he saw "-hit" somewhere inside, "-mith. I am now sure you have taken the necessary steps in acquiring my-" more scribbles "slave. I have solidified the" more scribbles, "details, as listed.
"1. The slave must be delivered at the return address listed on this package.
The slave must be prepared to call me "Master" and obey my every command.
The slave must be particularly attracted to" scribbles, "canines, and be prepared to pleasure me.
You must be present for the entire exchange.
You must ensure the slave is not a virgin. He may not be tight.
You must not interfere with the exchange, or speak unless I speak to you.
"You know how you can reach me. Signed, a" scribbles continued until the very end of the page, where two words were written in tiny letters, "concerned citizen.
The bear was so unsettled and disturbed by the entire letter that he nearly forgot that Damien was sitting at the kitchen table, eating breakfast.
"What is it? Another bill?" The young tiger asked Smith.
The bear looked up, panicked for an answer, but his stoic expression would never betray that fact to the tiger.
"No, it's a gift from a friend. He sent a letter with it." The bear said.
"That's nice. What is it?"
"Just a gift card for an online store."
"Aw, that's not exactly personal." The tiger said, disappointed.
"I haven't talked to him in years, my tastes could have changed." But they hadn't, "It would have been too risky to send anything else."
"Yeah, that makes sense. Well, spend it wisely." Damien smiled. And with that, Smith's fictional, nameless friend began to exist inside Damien's imagination. Smith felt a pang of guilt. But, he reasoned to himself, it was just like hypnosis. Damien believed something that wasn't true, the lie was just like hypnosis.
Wasn't it?
"Hey," the tiger said, getting up with dishes in hand, "I just wanted to say thanks for letting me stay here while I look for a job. I really appreciate it."
The bear smiled back, "It's no problem at all. I enjoy your company." He certainly had. The last week, Smith had spent every evening in the tiger's company, where he taught Damien how to pleasure another male and shown Damien what it feels to be pleasured by one. Yet, the thought of penetrating the young tiger never crossed his mind. He was too pure, too beautiful for it.
But he would have to.
Damien put his dishes in the sink and gave the bear a sincere, tight hug. Smith weakly wrapped his arms around the tiger, still apprehensive about what he would have to do.
Damien spent the day getting ready for an interview. It was at a local grocery store, where he would be a "customer service representative." He knew it was legalese for "bag boy," and that with hard work, he could become a cashier.
Yet as he sat there and stared at the interviewer, his potential manager looking at him expectantly, the tiger fumbled his words and didn't dictate what he really wanted to say.
If that was what he really wanted to say.
The prospect of a job meant getting money, getting money meant getting his own place, getting his own place meant saying goodbye to Smith...
As the tiger left the grocery store and headed to the bus stop, he felt uneasy about what to say to Smith, but comforted he'll have at least a few more days with him.
The bear sat on his queen-size bed and sighed, reading and rereading the letter in his hands. Damien was out at an interview, and it was the best time to think about the dreaded list. Where would he start? How far would he go? Was there any way out of this, or would he have to give up Damien to this "concerned citizen"?
The cell phone from the package rang. It was sitting on the bed next to him, like a sympathetic friend with no hand to put on his shoulder. It irritated Smith with its attempt at a symphony of beeps and boops. God, that thing was so old, Smith's parents had better phones before they died.
The bear picked it up and walked to the window, accepting the call and holding it to his ear.
"Hello?"
"Hello," an automated computer voice told him, "This is a courtesy call from Gerald's Pharmacy to remind you that your medication will be ready to be picked up at our location at-" Suddenly, the voice cut out, and another one appeared. Deeper and more estranged with a touch of an accent of questionable origin, it said "618 Highland Street." The same address as on the package he received... And then, a short burst of laughter that was cut off a moment into it, the other voice resuming. "Please pick up your order on Thursday by our closing time at 6 PM. Thank you. Goodbye!"
Smith thought the automated goodbye was far too cheerful for the circumstances.
Damien came back in the house with a dejected expression. He saw the bear peek out from behind a doorway in the kitchen and could hear the sink running. Must have just finished up his lunch, he thought.
"Hey! How'd the interview go?" He heard the cheery bear ask him.
Damien only needed to walk into the room for Smith to get his answer.
"I'm starting to wonder if I can get a job anywhere." The tiger slumped into a chair.
Smith moved over to Damien and gently rubbed his shoulders.
"What happened to all the practice interviews we had?"
"It's a lot easier with you. I'm not nervous with you."
Damien leaned back into the shoulder rubs. "I'm just...It's like I don't even want a job. Something's holding me back."
Smith gave a sigh, "Any idea what?"
Damien shook his head, "No. Something gets stuck in my throat, words just fall out of my mouth with no sense or meaning and I just...babble like an idiot. Do you think I'll ever be anything more than a leech on society?"
Smith leaned down and hugged the tiger, "I can already tell you that you make my life a little more worthwhile every day."
The tiger sighed and rolled his eyes.
Smith grinned, "Come on, I know how I can cheer you up."
Smith wrapped his arm around the tiger, whispering in Damien's ear as they spooned naked in his bed for the ninth evening in a row.
"Want to try something new?"
The tiger murred, gently stroking Smith's arms with a fingernail.
"Depends on what it is, I guess."
Smith traced a finger around from Damien's chest to his hip to just below his tail, circling Damien's pucker.
"I was hoping we could explore around here." The bear lied. He didn't want to do it at all, but he had to make sure the slave wouldn't be tight. No, he didn't want to think like that. He wanted to please the Tiger. He loved Damien and wanted to express that through making love.
Smith felt the tiger shiver at his touch, letting a slight murr escape his mouth. "I...I've never done this before..." He said.
"That's okay, I'll take care of it. You just relax and enjoy it." The bear whispered, slipping a finger in and slowly prodding around the tiger's rear.
More moans and purrs came from Damien, squirming a little as he was penetrated by the bear's finger. Smith saw that the tiger was pretty excited already, just from the prodding. He slipped another finger in, accompanied by more moans and murrs.
Damien wasn't particularly tight or loose. It was just like he was Goldilocks' tiger. Just right.
Three fingers in, and he could see that Damien was really enjoying himself, drops of pre soaking in the bedsheets as he started to ride the fingers' steady movements, and he even gave a shrill groan as one of the fingers touched his prostate.
"Oh god...that's....ohhh..." Damien whispered.
Smith grinned, and slowly took his fingers from the tiger's rear. "Ready for the main event?" He whispered in Damien's ear ever-so-softly.
Damien grinned, closing his eyes. "I've been ready for a long time..."
The bear smiled and took his own very excited arousal and let it touch and caress the space between the tiger's cheeks. Damien let out another moan, and the bear slowly slid himself inside the tiger.
Damien felt like he was being impaled on a tree trunk. Well, for the first few seconds, then it faded into a feeling of completeness, merging with the bear, feeling particularly linked. The tree trunk feeling did its best to keep itself alive though.
But then the bear started to thrust, and nature was the last of Damien's worries.
Surges and waves of pleasure flowed through him, and it only became more intense when the bear reached a hand around and started to stroke him while he would thrust in and out slowly.
He could hear the bear saying something, but it didn't matter, the words melted together in the pleasure, merely a comforting tone from his close friend.
Damien's hand gripped the pillow under his head tightly as he felt the pleasure escalate when the bear sped up his thrusts, riding the shaft back and forth, hearing the comforting groan coming from Smith behind him.
Things were going fuzzy around him. The tiger was feeling ecstasy through his body, tingling from his head to his toes. So close. So very close now.
Suddenly, the bear hilted himself inside him, and the tiger felt warmth spread inside him. And it was just enough to send him over the edge. His arousal throbbing, it sent ropes of seed over the edge of the bed and onto the floor.
They laid there together, just moaning and holding each other closely.
Smith kept his arms around the tiger, afraid that what he had just done, despite how wonderful it felt for the both of them, was motivated by his own survival.
He kept telling himself that it was love. That it was only because he loved the tiger and for no other reason. The tightness reason on that list was a coincidence.
"Robert?" The tiger asked, his eyes still closed.
Smith nuzzled Damien's neck and smiled. "Yeah?"
"I...I love you, Robert."
Smith was stunned for a good second or two. But he kept himself in the moment and happily responded.
"I love you too, Damien."
The tiger grinned and giggled, keeping them nice and close as the night went on. It wasn't long before Damien fell asleep, but Smith kept himself awake.
He never told the tiger to love him. Only to be attracted to him. Would this have developed eventually? Or was it just something that was clouding the tiger's mind? No, it felt honest, and Smith never used the word love when giving him the commands subconsciously.
His greatest hope and greatest fear had come true. They loved each other.
Smith started forming a plan for things to stay that way.
Damien was sitting in the passenger seat of his lover's car as they drove along an empty highway.
"Remind me again where we're going?" The tiger asked.
"Jeffery's, it's a great little cafe, but it's a bit of a ways away. Do you keep forgetting or something?" Smith replied, concerned.
Damien kept wondering just what was so great about Jeffery's that both of them had to cancel their plans to watch a movie together. It was much harder to cuddle in the car and in the cafe than at home on the couch.
Not only that, but Smith's persistence that they both try this new place seemed oddly out of place. Usually the bear liked to let him have his own vote in decisions like this, but Smith didn't take No for an answer.
"You seem nervous." The bear stated.
"It's nothing, I think." Damien muttered.
"How about some therapy?" Smith suggested.
Was the bear going to force this idea on him too? But it did seem like the right thing to do. He always enjoyed the sessions they had.
"How are we supposed to do this out here?"
"It's pretty easy, actually. There's something called "highway hypnosis," when a driver just zones out and forgets about his surroundings if he just keeps watching the straight road ahead of him. It's kind of like that."
"I guess. As long as you don't get us in an accident."
Smith smirked.
"Okay, just look forward at the road. See how it blends into the horizon? Try to find that spot where the road disappears, into infinity. Find that spot and feel yourself becoming more and more relaxed. All you need is the road and my voice."
The tiger did as requested and looked forward, finding the horizon line and the point where the two sides of the road appeared to converge. It was a single, unmoving point.
"Let everything else but that spot blur, focus only on that spot. Let it all fade away..."
It was, everything but the point in his vision began to dissolve...
"Relax and drift away...let your eyelids fall...feel completely at peace..."
Peaceful.
Relaxed.
Obedient.
Smith continued driving, reinforcing the tiger's entranced state, all the while thinking of the list of demands. If his plan were to work, he would still have to make sure that Damien complied with the "citizen's" rules.
With a sigh, he started giving his unknowing lover the commands.
"Tomorrow evening, we will meet a man together. You will recognize him as your Master, and you will do whatever he says of you, understand?"
Damien gave a positive grunt and a tiny suggestion of a nod.
"You will have one Master. You will only obey him unquestioningly. You will be of sound mind with everyone else."
Another, louder grunt.
"You will not remember what we will be doing for the next three hours. What you learn will sink deep inside you, and you will know what to do when I speak three words."
Smith repeated the words to him several times, then started from the beginning of his instructions. It took the entire trip for the bear to be satisfied the commands were sufficiently planted in the tiger.
The car rolled into the parking spot near the facility's front door.
"When I count to three, you will wake up. You will not ask questions about where we are or what we are doing. You will follow directions and continue learning and absorbing everything you see."
Smith put on the parking brake and turned the car off.
"Remember the three words. They will only take effect when I say them."
Smith opened the door.
"One. Two. Three."
Damien woke up.
They were in the car. Smith was still driving. His stomach growled.
"God, I know we ate just like, two hours ago, but I'm starving."
The bear chuckled.
"That's what happens when you only have a side salad."
"Can we get some Mickie Dee's or something?"
"Sure, but you better have something meaty."
"How about two cheeseburgers?"
"Good enough." Smith laughed. It was different than his usual laugh. A bit forced. Something was wrong.
A moment passed. A forced silence. A palpable sense of the awkward.
"Robert..." the tiger let his name fall off his tongue, lingering in the car for a few seconds. "You wouldn't lie to me, would you?"
The bear took his eyes off the empty road and looked straight at the tiger.
"I would only lie to you if your life was in danger by telling the truth." Something about the bear's gaze felt odd. It was strange for someone to look into the eyes of another for so long without a sense of love or anger.
"...Thanks." came the reply from Damien. He didn't know what else to say.
Robert Smith was washing his hands on the day of the exchange when the phone rang.
It was not his phone.
Smith picked up the aging cellular and answered the call.
"Hello?"
"Ooooh boy I hope you're excited! I know I am! I just found out what a pretty little kitty he is!" The voice was high and scratching. It was as pleasing to his ears as a cheese grater to the skin. "Remember! 6 Pee Emm SHARP!" And the call cut off.
Smith dropped the phone, questions flying through his mind. How much did this freak know? When did he find out who Damien was? Did he know about their trip away from the city?
He tried to reason with himself. There was no use trying to figure this out now. He had a plan. The only way to go was to proceed as planned.
Smith placed a hand on the counter of the kitchen and closed his eyes. He didn't even notice the tear slip down his face and drip from his nose onto his still-damp hand.
At 5:30 PM, Damien was laying on the couch and staring at the ceiling while he waited for the bear to get ready. He was dressed in jeans and a muscle shirt. The denim felt tighter around his waist than usual, as if it were poking into his gut, but it wasn't terrible.
"Why are you so nervous? What is it with you and this guy? Aren't you supposed to be friends?"
Smith appeared from upstairs, tying his necktie into a windsor knot, leaving it looser than usual.
"I haven't seen him in years, and I want both of us to make a good impression in order to get you this job. Come on, let's go."
The tiger found it strange that while Smith was wearing a vaguely formal suit, he chose to put on sneakers instead of dress shoes. He almost brought it up, but the bear was starting to sweat bullets, wiping his brow with his sleeve. Another time.
They drove downtown, with the sun setting slowly in the distance as six o'clock rolled around. Smith pulled up in front of an abandoned warehouse a few blocks away from the not-so-lively weeknight downtown area. Smith gripped the tiger's hand.
"I love you."
"I love you too." The tiger replied back.
And that was all the bear said.
Smith opened his door and stepped out of the car, leaving Damien completely confused and nervous. What were they doing there anyway? It wasn't the kind of place where you meet an old friend.
The tiger opened the passenger door and stepped out.
While heading for the nearest entrance to the building, a raccoon stepped out from behind another wall and pointed a gun at both of them. Damien froze out of instinct, but felt a strange shiver of recognition.
"Stay where you are. Both of ya." The raccoon said. And he followed it by searching Smith, patting him where the bear could be hiding any weapons. Smith was tense, but was closing his eyes despite slight shivers in his arms showing his unease. Satisfied that the bear was clean, the raccoon stepped back.
"You're not going to search me?" The tiger foolishly asked.
"Hey man, if I touch you, I don't get paid." The raccoon backed away, keeping the gun held up and pointed toward them until he faded into the shadows of the building.
Damien turned to the bear.
"What the hell was that? What's going on?"
Smith merely stared at the ground. He held out his hand, immaculately clean.
"Please...just trust me here. I promise you'll be safe."
Damien looked at the bear's face, which didn't turn to him but kept its gaze locked with the ground.
He could run. He could just flee and never come back. He could abandon the abandoned and run until his legs gave out. But where would that get him? Back on the streets with a coffee mug half empty with change.
The tiger took Smith's hand and they went inside.
The interior of the warehouse was about as boring as the tiger expected, but three times as ominous. Empty shelves stood in aligned sections throughout the entire building, vertical supports acting like prison bars to Damien's vision. Only a few of the lights were illuminated, and some were even hanging vertically by one chain, ready to fall at the slightest tremor.
Damien felt a pull at his hand. Smith was guiding him toward an empty area near the back. It was a clear space of about a hundred square feet.
"Robert...what are we doing here?" he asked.
The bear stopped him in the middle of the empty space and hugged him tightly.
"I'm sorry, Damien. I promise we'll be okay. I promise." He buried his muzzle into the tiger's shoulder for a few precious seconds until they both heard the sound of bare feet against the cement floor. Smith turned and looked at the newcomer, his eyes filling with signs of recognition and horror.
Before he could move his head to see the source of this fright, the tiger heard a voice.
"Turn and look at your Master, Damien."
Smith stared at the wolf before him as the wolf spoke those words.
The wolf was different than when he last saw him all those years ago. Back before he left the army, before he received his "keep quiet" checks, before he lived alone.
Before he saw that wolf jump out of a building to his death.
The wolf had dressed himself in a tuxedo, except the arms and legs were ripped off haphazardly, leaving fibers darting in all directions. He still managed to keep the vest and tie intact, a sickly pale yellow that only served to highlight his gaunt figure and ragged scruff. Not only was his clothing in disrepair, but his fur was matted and showing signs of some kind of disease. His left eye seemed to twitch occasionally, leaving the bear unsure just how stable he was. The wolf looked no better than any of the homeless Smith had seen with Damien on the day he met him.
This was not what he was hoping for.
Smith turned to look at Damien, whose face was already looking drowsy. He watched as the commands he implanted in the tiger's mind worked their terrible magic. Damien's eyelids drooped; his back hunched ever-so-slightly forward; his arms and hands relaxed.
"It's so beautiful." The wolf said.
Smith shot him a look that would have killed a small army.
"Give me the photos."
"Does it matter? You know that I've got them scanned onto a disk, right? Even if I did give them to you now, it wouldn't matter."
The bear growled and looked back at Damien, placing his hands on the tiger's shoulders.
"I lied Damien. Wake up, this is not your Master. You have no Master!"
Instantly, the wolf stepped in and separated them with his arms followed by his body.
"No, Smith. This slave is my property now! I forbid you to touch him!" The wolf snarled. Smith backed himself up against the nearby wall.
"He still deserves the right to live free, to have a name other than Slave!"
"So DID I!" The wolf snapped. His back arched and his body language switched. No longer was he the calm, foreboding wolf in a tuxedo ripped to shreds, but a raving madman mere inches away from the bear. He kept Smith trapped against the wall, pressing his face in and staring at the bear.
"I had a name, but you took it away from me! I once knew who I was, what I wanted to be, where I lived and when I was born. But now that's a mystery! A mystery you're going to help me discover the solution for!" The wolf stretched back his neck and let out a loud cackle that shook the foundation of the warehouse.
"What do you want from me? I'm just a lonely guy living in the suburbs!" Smith lied, trying to pretend that his past was not a factor in this conversation.
"LIAR! And what a terrible one! Of the few things I remember, one is you, Mister Smith. I remember seeing you seconds after I became aware, and before I realized you took it all away from me."
"It's not my fault. There was a power outage. Nothing we could do..."
"And WHY were you experimenting on me in the first place? Why was I dressed in army fatigues, hmm? I pieced it together, Smith. I knew what you were doing to me. The blackout did nothing that you wouldn't have done sooner or later.
"Do you know what it's like to have your mind fragmented like mine? I was an animal, Smith. I had a consciousness and nothing else. I wanted to find a way to survive. But it grew. My mind wanted more. Some of it wanted more.
"It grew in two directions, Smith. It's telling me to kill you right now and cook your meat over a fire while I use your beautiful tiger to breed. Not too smart considering my homosexual disposition, but hey, I do what it says. It's a situation that's starting to look REAL good, Smith. But I want to watch you squirm, first. To see you suffer like I did when I realized what I had become. What I am now."
The wolf backed away, pulling that demeanor of calm maliciousness back onto his countenance while pulling a knife from one of the pockets of his slacks.
"Do anything but watch and fear, and this goes..." He pantomimed pulling it across his own neck, causing the bear to sink to the ground in fear for Damien's life.
The tiger had stood there during the wolf's story, completely still. Smith had told him only to obey his Master, and now he had to watch the tiger be commanded by such a capable wolf.
The wolf curled up against the tiger's back, slipping his hand down the tiger's pants and feeling for his tailhole.
"Oooh, nice and loose down here. Did something right after all, Smith." The wolf muttered and then whispered to Damien. "Moan for me, slave."
The tiger let out a moan of ecstasy at the command, lifting his head and arching his back.
"Wonderful. I'm going to fuck you now, slave. Ready to give in to your master?"
"N...no...not ready..." Damien said in a monotone voice.
The wolf's eyes grew and a growl began to emanate from his throat.
"WHAT!?" He nearly shouted. "Smith! You didn't train me a proper slave! Those photos are going straight to the press!"
Smith saw the blade pressed up against the tiger's neck. Now was the time to drop his charade of fear and stop pandering to the wolf's desires. The bear's expression turned stoic and he gazed at the wolf.
"We both know that you're not leaving with any of those photos or any copies you made."
The wolf's eyes grew wider still. He withdrew the blade from around Damien's neck and pointed it at the bear, snarling.
"YOU TELL MY SLAVE TO OBEY ME OR BOTH OF YOU ARE AS GOOD AS DEAD!"
With a flicker of hope in his chest, Smith turned to the tiger and said three words.
"Obey your Master."
BANG
The wolf fell in a bloody mess to the cold cement floor of the warehouse. He epitomized the last word he ever said. The wolf never found his name, never got revenge on Smith for what he had done to him, and never used his brand new slave.
Damien stood for a moment, not realizing that he was even holding a gun in his hands, much less one that was still smoking. As it dawned on him, he remembered the poking sensation in his midriff the entire day. It was there, he just didn't know it, as if it were drawn in invisible ink.
He dropped the gun, which clattered with an echo on the cement floor. The tiger sank to his knees, his breathing starting to speed up, clenching his hands into fists at the sudden tidal wave of emotions and thoughts in his mind.
Robert. Where was Robert?
A quick turn of the head, and his question was answered. Even the bear couldn't hide his shock and disgust with another stoic expression, but he saw the tiger and scrambled toward him, supporting Damien's back just as the tiger felt it was going to give out. Robert leaned down and whispered in his ear.
"I'm sorry...I'm so sorry...It was the only way. I had to protect you. I had to keep you safe." Robert kept repeating between subtle sobs and gentle wheezes.
As the tiger felt the warmth of the bear, he could only think of one response.
"I love you too."
Robert pulled him in closer if it was even possible, keeping the tiger's body against his.
"Oh god, I'm so sorry, Damien...I'm sorry I made you do this. Forgive me. For everything."
More facts poured into his mind. The tiger was suddenly aware of what the bear said during their hypnosis sessions. What he did with him. What he made him think. What he made him feel.
"I..." the tiger mumbled.
It kept coming. How many moments they shared together. How much of it was aided by the thoughts put in there by the bear? What did the words both of them said really mean?
"I love you so much, Damien. I'm so sorry...I'll never make you do that again. I love you..."
And Damien knew. The bear was not being particularly poetic, but the tiger knew what those words meant, between Robert's sobs and breaths. He saved that word for after he heard it from Damien first.
"I forgive you, Robert...I still love you."
Robert pulled himself up enough to look into the tiger's eyes. He didn't need to ask "Really?" because he could tell from the smile on Damien's face. He buried his muzzle in the tiger's shoulder again, sobbing in joy.
"Robert?" Damien said.
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"I've been messing up my interviews on purpose because I've been afraid that getting a job would mean moving out."
Robert laughed.
"You can live with me for as long as you want." The bear said.
Damien sighed and felt the back of the bear's neck fondly, weakly nuzzling him.
30 hours before that moment, Robert Smith led a very dazed-looking tiger into a firing range after paying for a basic lesson in firing a handgun.
"He's been on medication recently, so he may seem a bit out of it, but I assure you he's completely safe." Smith had told the clerk.
"Sir, we can't give the guy a lesson if he's lightheaded and stuff. It's dangerous." The clerk had replied.
"It's imperative that he learns this though. I can't emphasize just how important this happens to be."
After enough haggling, Smith convinced the clerk, who also gave the lessons, taking them both over to a private partition and showing Damien how to load the firearm.
Damien repeated the action after watching the clerk.
The clerk showed Damien how to aim toward the target and which areas were the most effective, and then gave him the gun.
Damien fired without warning, sending seven shots to perforate the middle of the target, where a person's chest would be.
Both Robert Smith and the clerk stood in amazement before the clerk turned to the bear.
"I'll give you a refund. This guy clearly knows what he's doing. He absorbed recoil like he's been using a gun since he was a cub."
Robert Smith bought the gun Damien used in the lesson. The gun that would later kill the wolf that threatened them both, who would be found by the police 48 hours after his death, who would not be identified and would remain an unsolved murder under the name "John Doe."
Robert Smith led Damien back to the car and started driving back toward their home.
"Before I wake you up, Damien, you will answer one question truthfully. Where did you learn to fire a handgun?"
"The Army." Damien replied in monotone.
"What did you do in the Army?"
"I don't remember."
Perhaps Robert Smith had met Damien before that fateful day in front of the theater after all.
"Damien, on the count of three, you will wake up. You will not remember what we did in the last three hours. You will remember what to do when I say the three words. You will move deep in your consciousness and pull that training back out and use it. For now, you will wake up, and remember that we went to a small cafe for lunch.
"One. Two. Three."
The End