John Gone Read Free Page A

just being
stubborn.”
    “I wish it was as simple as that.”
    “Bring yourself here,” Virgil said
sternly.
    John slowly walked around the desk to the
elderly man, his embarrassment growing with each cautious step.
    It’s going to come off the second he
touches it , John knew, and I’m going to end up looking like
an idiot. Mom’s going to kill me when he tells her .
    Virgil hurriedly took hold of John’s arm and
turned the wrist upside-down. After unlatching the watch’s band, he
tugged on its face. “If you’re going to take a job in the modern
workforce,” he said, “you’re going to need to learn to--“ The watch
wasn’t budging.
    Virgil loosed John’s arm. “Now, what’s going
on here?” he asked, sounding more than a little frustrated.
    “I don’t know,” John answered honestly,
almost glad that Virgil had been equally unsuccessful in figuring
it out. “It was easy to put on.”
    Virgil muttered something under his breath
and opened his desk’s left drawer. “Now where did I put that
whatchamacallit?” he asked himself as he fumbled through its
contents. After a few moments his hand reappeared holding a large,
wooden-framed Holmesian magnifying glass. He lifted it to John’s
wrist and inspected the watch. “If this is some sort of trick, lad
... ”
    “It’s not.”
    After a few passes over the watch, Virgil
finished his examination. “Alright, son, this calls for some good,
old fashioned ingenuity. Something you kids today never learned on
your inter-webs.”
    Virgil opened his desk drawer again and
traded the magnifying glass for what appeared to be a pair of old
wire cutters. The tool was rusted, made from two pieces of solid
metal attached by a single bolt and spring. He flexed them open and
closed in his hand.
    “As good as the day I bought them,” he said
proudly. He took John’s wrist at the watch and brought it close to
his body.
    “Wait!” John protested. “What are you going
to do with those?”
    “Don’t worry, lad, I’m not going to cut your
arm off. Just this newfangled thing stuck to it.”
    Holding the boy’s arm with his left hand, he
slowly slid the side of the cutters between the watch and John’s
arm.
    As the tip of the tool connected with the
metal of the watch’s face, a bright-blue electric arc shot from the
watch to the wire cutters to Virgil’s wrinkled hand and up the
length of his arm. A high-pitched squeal and loud pop followed a split-second later. Virgil cried out, but only for a
moment before releasing John’s arm and falling stiffly from his
chair to the ground with a thud, silencing the room.
    The surprise had sent John tumbling backward
onto his rear. After recovering from the fall, he held his breath,
listening to the eerie quiet that had taken the room. He looked to
the watch on his wrist. It was still there. Nothing had
changed.
    “Mr. Virgil?” John called quietly. He waited
a few moments for a reply before beginning a crawl to the other
side of his new boss’s desk.
    “ Ahh! ” he exclaimed as he found the
body. “Virgil! Virgil, are you alright?” There was no reply.
    John sprung from the floor and leaned over
the desk for a different view. He found Virgil completely stiff,
eyes wide open, face affright, lying sideways in a seated position
on the floor.
    John nervously extended his hand toward the
old man’s mouth to feel for breath. There was none. “Virgil?” he
asked.
    John had never seen a dead body before. It
was surprisingly terrifying for something so still and quiet. As he
backed away, he noticed the mark on Virgil’s hand where the
electricity had entered. Parts of the skin were now a darkened red,
littered with small black scabs the size of pinpoints covering the
area like a rash. It was the sort of wound one might expect to
receive from a generator or breaker, not a small wristwatch powered
by a dime-sized battery.
    John felt sick. Nervously holding the
corpse’s gaze, he backed toward the door to leave the room.