noticed. The guards watch him all the time now.
5/16/13
Kiro’s used the code again. He just said “Soon.”
5/21/13
Dios.
I woke up to screams and tried my door and it was locked. I hammered on it and no one let me out. I heard gunfire, and something howling loud and deep and awful. One more scream. Then silence.
Then Kiro’s voice, telling me it’s all okay. But it isn’t Kiro’s voice at all, it’s his pronunciation through a bullhorn two octaves lower, thanking me and trying the door. It may take a while to find the key, he says, or should he just break it down?
I begged him to stop and he laughed. I never heard the real Kiro laugh, this was like a bass drum or a cough or a barking walrus.
“You will see,” he said, or it, the thing that used to be Kiro. “Eun-Mi will understand if she is lucky, when her child explains. OUR child.”
I asked him what he did to her and he said the dreams were full of love. That the iden-inshi is a love letter from something older and wiser and greater, something willing to suffer and sacrifice to make us more like it.
I asked about his daughter and he said, “I will find her and I will give her this same gift you gave me. The same prize I can give you. You will see my new self and be amazed.”
I started screaming then. He laughed along with my shrieks. Then he left to get the key. His footsteps make the floor shake.
Before he walked away though, he asked me how I would get out of a military base in the middle of North Korea without him. What my fate would be if I was left behind, alive and pregnant with ex-Kiro’s get.
“You are a genius, for what you are. But be a genius of what you might become! Your mind has opened the door to a deeper, better world. Your children will go through it… OUR children. It is up to you whether you accompany them.”
He is back.
I hear the key in the lock.
PUSHING BACK
By JC Hemphill
Sikowitz lifted his head and blinked against the sweat running off his brow. The room wasn't hot; no glaring spotlight was present. Otherwise, the interrogation room resembled those from television.
"Finding death," Sikowitz answered in a voice that suggested a long night of screaming, "is never welcome."
He wanted to lie down, sleep. The detective's questions and the cramped room were making him feel dizzy, almost ill.
The lean, narrow-eyed detective sat back. A toothpick danced from one end of his mouth to the other. "Is that right? You're saying you found the body?"
"Yes."
"So how 'bout the blood on your hands? Was that unwelcome, too?"
"Of course. That wasn't ..."
Sikowitz couldn't finish. Not with the pain expanding in his abdomen. It came out of nowhere and made him forget the accusing stare coming from the opposite side of the table.
The detective grunted. "Wasn't what?"
Sikowitz clenched his jaw and swallowed a lump of mucus the size of a human heart. "That wasn't ... pleasant." He shut his eyes, willing the pain away.
"Uh-huh. That doesn't explain the bloody hands. But lemme guess. You were trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together again."
Sikowitz opened his eyes, found his vision full of water, and closed them again. The pain was spreading. "No," he croaked. "Not ... back together. Back ..."
The small room filled with cries of agony. Sikowitz groaned and screamed and whimpered as his stomach revolted against the whole, seeming to double in size, testing the flexibility of soft tissue while strangling his other organs. His lungs burned. It felt like he'd pulled an Ozzy and snorted fire ants and now they were inside him, biting, gnawing, devouring the pinkness one infinitesimal chunk at a time.
The image of Mark's body flashed across his mind.
It was happening, he realized. What happened to Mark was happening to him. And it was coming on fast.
"Hell, Sikowitz," the detective said. "The flu act only works in movies. I wouldn't let you out of this room if--"
"Sh-Shut up," Sikowitz demanded. Things had
5/16/13
Kiro’s used the code again. He just said “Soon.”
5/21/13
Dios.
I woke up to screams and tried my door and it was locked. I hammered on it and no one let me out. I heard gunfire, and something howling loud and deep and awful. One more scream. Then silence.
Then Kiro’s voice, telling me it’s all okay. But it isn’t Kiro’s voice at all, it’s his pronunciation through a bullhorn two octaves lower, thanking me and trying the door. It may take a while to find the key, he says, or should he just break it down?
I begged him to stop and he laughed. I never heard the real Kiro laugh, this was like a bass drum or a cough or a barking walrus.
“You will see,” he said, or it, the thing that used to be Kiro. “Eun-Mi will understand if she is lucky, when her child explains. OUR child.”
I asked him what he did to her and he said the dreams were full of love. That the iden-inshi is a love letter from something older and wiser and greater, something willing to suffer and sacrifice to make us more like it.
I asked about his daughter and he said, “I will find her and I will give her this same gift you gave me. The same prize I can give you. You will see my new self and be amazed.”
I started screaming then. He laughed along with my shrieks. Then he left to get the key. His footsteps make the floor shake.
Before he walked away though, he asked me how I would get out of a military base in the middle of North Korea without him. What my fate would be if I was left behind, alive and pregnant with ex-Kiro’s get.
“You are a genius, for what you are. But be a genius of what you might become! Your mind has opened the door to a deeper, better world. Your children will go through it… OUR children. It is up to you whether you accompany them.”
He is back.
I hear the key in the lock.
PUSHING BACK
By JC Hemphill
Sikowitz lifted his head and blinked against the sweat running off his brow. The room wasn't hot; no glaring spotlight was present. Otherwise, the interrogation room resembled those from television.
"Finding death," Sikowitz answered in a voice that suggested a long night of screaming, "is never welcome."
He wanted to lie down, sleep. The detective's questions and the cramped room were making him feel dizzy, almost ill.
The lean, narrow-eyed detective sat back. A toothpick danced from one end of his mouth to the other. "Is that right? You're saying you found the body?"
"Yes."
"So how 'bout the blood on your hands? Was that unwelcome, too?"
"Of course. That wasn't ..."
Sikowitz couldn't finish. Not with the pain expanding in his abdomen. It came out of nowhere and made him forget the accusing stare coming from the opposite side of the table.
The detective grunted. "Wasn't what?"
Sikowitz clenched his jaw and swallowed a lump of mucus the size of a human heart. "That wasn't ... pleasant." He shut his eyes, willing the pain away.
"Uh-huh. That doesn't explain the bloody hands. But lemme guess. You were trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together again."
Sikowitz opened his eyes, found his vision full of water, and closed them again. The pain was spreading. "No," he croaked. "Not ... back together. Back ..."
The small room filled with cries of agony. Sikowitz groaned and screamed and whimpered as his stomach revolted against the whole, seeming to double in size, testing the flexibility of soft tissue while strangling his other organs. His lungs burned. It felt like he'd pulled an Ozzy and snorted fire ants and now they were inside him, biting, gnawing, devouring the pinkness one infinitesimal chunk at a time.
The image of Mark's body flashed across his mind.
It was happening, he realized. What happened to Mark was happening to him. And it was coming on fast.
"Hell, Sikowitz," the detective said. "The flu act only works in movies. I wouldn't let you out of this room if--"
"Sh-Shut up," Sikowitz demanded. Things had
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