Variant Exchange Read online

  “Well then, did you get it?” Makeup-lady demanded.

  “Let’s show a little courtesy, here.” Fancy-man said, as he led Patrick over to a chair and helped him sit down. Patrick moaned at this and Lena’s blood began to boil.

  “Perhaps you should lay down instead.” Fancy-man continued with an amount of concern. “Whatever we need to do to make you feel at ease, we’ll do. You’ve had a long night.”

  Patrick looked around the room with a blank, long stare in his eyes. He seemed confused, lost even…like he was waking up in a room full of strangers. When he looked at Lena, however, he attempted one of his obnoxious smiles. The ends of his mouth didn’t really curl up evenly, but she saw the hint of it. Lena held back the tears that were welling up as best she could. She knew he was trying to be brave for her. And given the circumstances, he was doing smashingly. That is, until he saw Makeup-lady holding the medical kit.

  “Not her.” he protested, forcefully.

  “She’s our qualified medic.” Red-hat declared, “Who else would look after you?”

  “I don’t care. Not her.”

  “Oh, what’s wrong with me, pussycat.” Makeup-lady said, feigning insult.

  “Everything is wrong with you, you fucking psychopath.” he said matter-of-factly.

  “Well, suit yourself.” she said dismissively, tossing the medical kit to Lena, “Let’s see how your girlfriend here does patching you up.”

  Lena didn’t really catch the medical kit, as much as she fumbled it. “Me?” she thought, “What the hell am I supposed to do with this?!”

  Patrick, assisted by Lena, hobbled over to an alcove surrounded with the pointless frosted-glass panels, where a bed blissfully awaited him. He walked over and slowly lay down, with a few pained groans. Lena tried to help him as much as she could. When he finally lay down, she breathed a sigh of relief. At least for the moment, he was as comfortable as he could be. She just prayed that she would find something in the medical kit that could be of assistance.

  Unfortunately, as she snapped off the seals and opened the case, she was immediately confounded by the contents as the insides of the case seemed to spill out a thousand-fold, revealing an ungodly amount of bandages, salves, scissors, things, and…well, lots of stuff that looked exactly like other stuff. Yes, ‘stuff’ seemed to be the best word to describe it all. Gingerly, she fumbled through its disheveled contents, hoping that something would steal her attention before she had to admit to her ignorance.

  “Don’t worry,” Patrick began roughly, “you’re already doing better than Dragon Lady.”

  “Dragon Lady?” Lena laughed.

  “Yeah, that’s what we call her back at the office.” he responded weakly, “We have a lot of interesting people we work with—some more interesting than others as you’ve probably noticed. And then there’s her.” He added this last part with a note of disgust. “She’s lucky she’s useful. Unfortunately for us, she’s very useful at a lot of things. She is literally a psychopath. I think that helps her focus, but it also makes her really scary.”

  “I think I know what you mean.” Lena agreed, fumbling through the kit.

  Once she realized she wasn’t going to find anything particularly useful, she settled on a small bottle of what she hoped was pain pills. Taking a few from Lena, Patrick showed his satisfaction by gulping them down without any water. As Patrick waited for relief to kick in, the two remained silent for a moment. Patrick was the first to speak, after the brief pause.

  “You know, you aren’t actually going to get to see my ass. So, don’t ask.”

  She giggled awkwardly before responding, “It’s ok. I didn’t want to see your naked ass anyway.”

  “Liar.”

  “Patrick…” she started, stifling back emotions that were threatening to take over, “Why did they make you do it?”

  “That’s how most intelligence work is, really.” he replied weakly. “Find someone with information or access, and determine the price. Everyone has information, access to something, and everyone has a price; but very few people have the information or access you want. The people that do are generally powerful, and powerful people don’t want money, drugs or immunity—they can already buy all of that. So, their price is almost always sex.”

  Laughing weakly, he added, “Prostitutes generally do the trick for most diplomats, bodyguards, and aides, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. But I think you will find that powerful people can already buy sex. It’s the kind of sex they can’t readily get that they are truly looking for. And the more powerful they are, the stranger their fantasies end up being. I’ve seen some things that would make your blood curdle...”

  “But Patrick, why did they…your coworkers…make you do that?”

  “I don’t know, Lena.” he replied, with resignation, “I don’t know.”

  “Well then, what...”

  Lena was interrupted by the muffled sounds of a man screaming just outside the door of the suite, along with another man shouting, “Shut your mouth!” Just then, the front door slammed open, banging into the wall behind it with force. It was a much older man who was screaming bloody murder as he stumbled inside. Although perhaps ‘shoved’ may have more accurately described the situation. As the scene focused before Lena, she flushed with rage. There he was: Lord Piggy himself. He was escorted by Wart-face, who looked absolutely murderous. Lord Piggy was shove-marched into the room with his pants and underwear hanging around his ankles. With every waddling step, his personal parts wiggled and bounced. Somehow, he appeared even fatter unclothed and the sweat and indignant expression on his red face made the man look almost comical. Lena would have found him comical under other circumstances, but she was all too aware of what was likely in store for this pathetic disgrace of a man.

  As she watched, Red-hat and Wart-face shoved Lord Piggy into one of the metal folding-chairs, forcing him down and roughly binding him with coarse rope.

  “This is an outrage.” he shouted, “I am a senior diplomatic official of France. I demand to know...”

  “You are a traitor to your country.” Dragon Lady said plainly, barely even looking in his direction from across the room. “You are a drunk, a boy-fucker, a conspirator and a rapist. You are no friend of France and you are no friend to the GDR. We have no reason to recognize you as anything more worthwhile.”

  “When word gets out...” he threatened.

  “When word gets out that you took a trip to East Germany simply to abuse young boys, you mean.” she interrupted, casually.

  “I’m quite certain I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Lord Piggy stated indignantly.

  “Look,” Fancy-man broke in, “I’m just going to cut this short. It’s been a long night for a lot of us. And thanks to you, I have an agent that now needs medical attention. So, I’m going to make this easy.”

  “I don’t have to listen to a word of this!” Lord Piggy shouted.

  “You do, and you will.”

  “You are nothing to me! I am a senior diplomatic official of the sovereign nation of France, and I demand that you release me this very instant! Or I...”

  “Just give me two seconds.” Dragon Lady interrupted them both, as she grabbed a few items off a small desk nearby, before walking over to Lord Piggy. They looked like thick, sharp bobby-pins attached to long wires—wires that ran to an ominous looking box on the desk. Holding the wired bobby-pins in front of Lord Piggy’s face, she said mater-of-factly, “I’m going to attach these to your nipples. Then, I’m going to electrocute you for the rest of the night. I’m going to do this because you won’t shut up, and I’m sick of you interrupting.”

  With this, she ripped open Lord Piggy’s shirt forcefully, grabbed one of the objects and began moving it towards his chest.

  “No! You…you can’t! When the Ambassador hears...” he shouted. His protests were abruptly cut off, howeve
r, as Dragon Lady pinched one of his nipples and roughly threaded a bobby pin through. He shrieked in an octave so pathetic, Lena almost felt disgusted. Almost.

  “Alright!” he cried out. “A-alright! I’m sorry! I’ll...” Dragon Lady ignored him as she grabbed the other nipple and threaded another bobby pin through. He shrieked again, although this time it seemed curiously higher-pitched.

  “I’m going to start on a medium setting, I think.” she said in a sickeningly sweet voice, “We’ll give you fifteen minutes, then see how much we should turn it up.”

  “I’m sorry! I apologize! Please…I apologize!” Lord Piggy began to cry.

  “Anita,” Dragon Lady addressed one of the trashy ladies, “would you be a dear and flip the switch over there?”

  “Please! I’ll do anything…anything, I swear it!”

  “Anita, the switch.”

  “No, damnit, please! Please.” Lord Piggy sobbed, crying like a baby.

  “Are you going to shut up?” Red-hat cut in.

  “Yes! Yes, I swear it!”

  “Are you sure you swear it?”

  “Yes, for God sake, I promise!!!”

  “…because I’ve seen her work on someone for days, and I’ll be honest with you, once you leave here, back to that shithole you call home, I still have to work with her. And she’s going to be really upset with me if I take away her plaything.”

  “Please don’t let her…please….” Lord Piggy, who had by now been reduced to a mewling sack of blubber, hyperventilated.

  “Not one word.” Red-hat menaced. “Not one single damn word. If you interrupt any one of us, we’ll make sure it’s a long week for you. And those bobby pins can attach anywhere.” Red-hat punctuated this by taking a quick look down at Lord Piggy’s piggly offerings, “...anywhere.”

  The look on Lord Piggy’s face combined with the wideness of his eyes, telling a story that the sounds he wanted to make couldn’t have done a better job at communicating. Lena was almost disappointed that he had so quickly silenced himself; not a hic, nor a sob…not anything.

  Fancy-man took this opportunity to walk over to the desk and grab Dragon Lady’s fake tabloid cover. He then walked back over to Lord Piggy and stuck it in his face.

  “This is you.” he said, pointing. “See over there on the bed? That’s the other guy.”

  Patrick overheard this, and gave a half-hearted wave while exhaustedly shouting, “Up yours, buddy!”

  Lord Piggy didn’t respond vocally. He simply looked at the paper. He examined it for almost an entire minute before closing his eyes. Moment by moment brought more realization to his countenance. Soon, he began nodding his head repeatedly in utter defeat and resignation. He knew he was caught. And he knew if he tried to lie his way out of it, he would suffer for it. So, he simply sat there, eyes closed, nodding his head up and down.

  “Look over there.” Fancy-man said, pointing to the corner where the tired man in the unbuttoned polo sat typing away on one of the bulky computers. “We have audio of the entire encounter, and transcripts are being produced right now.” He then pointed to the desk, where Lord Piggy’s briefcase sat. “There, that’s your briefcase. We have the documents that were inside, thanks to your aide who decided to be otherwise occupied.”

  Cackling, Dragon Lady began opening and closing an imaginary briefcase and taunting, “Stasi pricks! Stasi pricks!”, and Lord Piggy went a shade redder.

  “Now,” Fancy-man continued, “You will agree to a relationship with our organization and become our perfect little French mole—you will go where we want you to go, say what we want you to say, and hold whatever opinion we tell you to have when we have one. You will spy for us, toe the line for us, and be our little whipping boy when we need you to be. Do this, and you will be richly rewarded with our silence. Don’t do this...” Fancy-man began tapping the page again, “And this won’t just get published…we’ll make sure your wife and children see. Do you understand?”

  Lord Piggy finally spoke, with a quick, “Yes. Yes, I promise!”

  “Good.” Fancy-man said. “And just in case you decide you are going to have a little change of heart, our friend here...” he said, motioning to Dragon Lady, “is going to be following your every move. Understand that she is excellent at tracking down people like you. And this I promise you...” Fancy-man leaned into Lord Piggy’s face, menacing so close that his breath fogged the man’s eyeballs, “She will start with your kids. Then she’ll move on to your wife. This will be a slow process, and you will see every second of it. I promise you, the last thoughts your precious family will have is of how dissapointed they are that you got them murdered, because you wanted to abuse a boy. Then and only then, after she has slowly killed everyone you hold dear, will she finally kill you. Understand?”

  “Yes! Yes, good sir! I swear it!”

  “Good.” Fancy-man said, as he raised his arm, motioning to the rest of the agents in the room. As everyone started towards the door, he added, “Now, we have an agent that we need to get to the infirmary, and then the rest of us need to get some sleep. Of course, we owe you a token of appreciation for your indiscretion. In order to thank you properly for raping one of my agents, I’m going to leave you with our lovely friend here for the rest of the night.”

  Dragon Lady approached with a vile grin on her face. Through the most wide, dead eyes Lena had ever seen, she visibly relished the events that were to come.

  “Like he said…” Fancy-man stated plainly, before walking out the front door, “they can attach anywhere.”

  The room began clearing out then, beginning with the tired-looking man and one of the trashy women who helped Patrick stumble into the hallway. As Wart-face walked by the table with Lena’s pen on it, however, he turned to look at it.

  “You want a souvenir?” he growled, picking it up and motioning it towards Lena. For a few scant seconds, Lena judged whether accepting it back counted as ‘liking them’, or if she could still give the impression of hateful acceptance. Deciding that now was not the time to be obstinate, she grudgingly took it and threw it in her purse. As Lena slowly followed Wart-face out the door, she heard the begging and pleading behind her. Soon, the pleading turned into screams, then louder screams, and finally high-pitched wails. Lena tried to close her eyes as she shut the door behind her, but she did catch a glimpse of Lord Piggy soiling himself.

  Das Großartige Spiel

  As their touring van rolled through Checkpoint Charlie just a few minutes ago, Lena’s vision had tunneled, punctuating the furious tightening in her chest. She felt like prey to the armed Americans with their machine guns, and the East German soldiers who barked orders loudly back and forth. She clearly saw the razor wire, and the killing zone with the tank-stars, the turrets and the searchlights. And she felt precisely what they were intended to make her feel. “Turn back!” the toxic fortifications screamed, “It’s not safe on the other side! Turn back for your life!” She held her breath in fear, awaiting any number of terrible sequences that would culminate in her life oozing out onto the already-soiled dirt. Gunmetal decay with a lead-flavored grin; another silenced no-one; a squished bedbug on the brown-soiled mattress of internationalism and nihilist game theory.

  But now that she was through, West Berlin appeared so bright and colorful it almost hurt her eyes. As the van drove further into the West, Lena couldn’t help but compare the two worlds (and make no mistake, they were worlds apart). Oh sure, neon signs existed on both sides of the blockade, as did, cars, first dates, beer and night-time music. But here in the West, the sheer scope made your head spin. The neon signs were everywhere, along with event centers for everything from pornography (that existed openly?!?) to drugs (drugs?! People did drugs?!) and wild dance clubs (they looked like orgies from outside). It was positively scandalous! Advertisements filled every flat surface, openly suggesting the reward of free sex for purchasing everything from toothpaste to
dry-cleaning. That, or they offered everything from a moonlight fetish-show to a coke-fueled art gallery. Night-time music here, in contrast, made her punk band look practically kitsch. From their little tour van, she could hear everything from wailing electric guitars to brawny synths, mashing against tribal drums that were equal parts death knell and mating dance. God, this city had everything.

  The second-most readily visible difference were the cars. In the East, there were very few car factories and basically no imports. Thus, there were really only a few cars everyone purchased: a Wartburg or a Trabant. These were homely little tin-cans that were as comfortable as they were zippy— which is to say not very. This was largely owed to the fact that they had been mostly the same models since the late 60’s. After all, why improve on something that worked and likely wouldn’t kill you for most of its stated service life? Besides, it was completely realistic to wait almost ten years for your car to arrive after paying for it, and until that point, it was either mass transit or good old pedal power. When your square-wheeled, Socialist-flavored jalopy finally showed up, well, it was a reason for the whole neighborhood to celebrate.

  Here in the West, however, cars were absolutely everywhere, and absolutely everyone had one. Some even had two, Lena had heard! And there were so many kinds—BMW’s, Mercedes, Volkswagens—all with multitudinous colors, custom parts (like fancy hubcaps!!!) and speakers that blared music Lena had never heard before. These cars choked the roads like stampeding metal wilder beasts. It must have been terrifying to cross the street with so many death-machines rolling around everywhere. Yet folks just scampered across the road every which way, completely ignoring the very real reality of instant horrible death that sat honking mere inches away.