Time Sensitive Target

Part 39 - Consequences of Lying

Jase turned the volume on the stereo up as soon as he switched the engine to a purr, an offensively loud symphony filling the car and dashing any hope of explaining myself. I wanted to reach out and settle the sound to a less disruptive level, but I got the impression he'd intentionally wound it up either to annoy me or prevent me from speaking.

By the time we had crawled through the San Diego traffic and parked in the apartment lot it was late afternoon, the heat of the day at it's peak. Jase wordlessly opened the trunk and selected two light bags, handing them to me without so much as an upwards glance. He grasped several heavier ones with ease and locked the car, leaving some of the dried goods and the TV behind for a second trip. I wondered when I should seize the moment, but Jase's expression was so stony in the elevator I didn't dare disturb the silence. He set the bags down outside the door and fished for the keys in his pocket.

"Wait here," he ordered quietly and entered alone, abandoning the shopping. In less than a minute he re-emerged. "Ok," he said, standing clear of the doorway to let me enter. I walked past him in the uncomfortably narrow space. It was one thing to be sat next to him in a car, but another to be so near him in the privacy of an empty apartment.

I set my two designated bags down next to the couch, watching as Jase brought the remainder through from the front door. I'd wait until he left to fetch the rest from the car before I unpacked the shopping, that way I could avoid unnecessary proximity. With the last bag placed on the counter, Jase turned to leave and stopped in his tracks only a few feet away from me.

"You can't slip up like that in front of anyone at the agency. Or the doctors," he said, eventually turning around to fix his unreadable expression at me.

"I didn't- it doesn't work like tha- it's not what you think," I began hopelessly. I was so tired, and so frustrated. Without proper energy and concentration levels it was near impossible to explain myself properly.

"No? How does it work?" Jase challenged, crossing his arms. I instinctively took a step back, his expression hauntingly familiar. There was twinkle in his green eyes, suspicion and an invitation to try him. After all, he always won.

"It's difficult to... the ice cream is melting," the sodden tub distracted me, beads of sweat forming a small pool on the kitchen island.

"I don't eat ice cream," Jase didn't budge his eyes from their direct gaze.

"So... why did you buy it?"

"You can eat it."

"I said I didn't wa-"

"So let it melt," he smiled softly, his gentle glare glittering more than ever. Why did he enjoy watching me squirm?

"I... it's not an exact science. Sometimes if I see something, I can remember some details of it after. It just... comes back to me. Not with everything," I lied. If I wanted to I could conjure all kinds of strange information. The road signs we'd passed, particular pages of the contract I'd signed in precise detail. I could do it with most things I looked at, but recalling the particulars was less and less likely the more time went on.

"Did you lie to me? Under Hyocine Pentothal?" His features were unreadable. This was what made him so unnerving. How could he be so completely calm, and tie someone to a chair to torture them. He had to be a psychopath.

"No," I answered truthfully. "I swear I didn't." My hands were trembling uncontrollably. What could he do in this apartment? There were no ropes to restrain me, but I supposed he was trained in the art of using the materials to hand. In which case there was not a lot he couldn't do. The image of his taunting emotionless face as he sliced the fabric of my trousers jolted in my mind, his fingers brushing the tender skin of my inner thigh.

"And why would that mean anything to me?" He levelled. Stupidly I wanted to cry. There was so much I wanted to say but it all swirled around my brain in a muddled soup, leaving me unable to pull out the points I wanted to make. The irony of his question was outrageous, there was plenty I could hurl back in a vile outburst... but the words were out of reach.

"Do you have-" I smiled in disbelief, the first genuine smile to grace my mouth in longer than I cared to remember. "-Any idea what it was like in the place you rescued us- me- from?" I frowned in fury at myself. Us. It hadn't been just me there, after all. Jas had been left behind, ashes in a Syrian outpost, thousands of miles from home.

"I know what it was," Jase remained still, arms folded. I scoffed slightly.

"No," a wave of calm enveloped me unexpectedly. It was as though my ghost- the person I was before all this, had stepped beside me and laid a comforting hand on my shoulder. "You don't, or you wouldn't need the explanation. Every time I lost consciousness I'd be injected with adrenaline to keep me awake and sustain more torture. Each time I was less and less aware of who I was, where I was... It made me ill, I think. I remember feeling like I was dying," I watched a drip of perspiration slip down the side of the ice cream tub. "I was delirious. So no, I can't recall every detail from that page. And yes, I lied to you when I first recognised it. I knew what it meant for me, I was trying to protect myself. Don't worry, you made the consequences of lying to you very clear," sudden strength possessed me to look him in the eyes, the sparkle of deviance in his extinguished by a hard storm. I seized control of my unexpected courage and strode past him to the kitchen island, plucking the tub of ice cream from the counter and shoving it in the freezer before it was too late.

*

"-Don't worry, you made the consequences of lying to you very clear." Paige's stormy blue eyes met Jase's hard gaze. A hundred bombs could have dropped around him and Jase wouldn't have noticed, tension seized his chest and the pit of his stomach, knocking the wind out of him for a fraction of a second. Paige walked around his rigidly still frame, clattering behind with the cupboards and groceries.

Move, Jase told himself. Focus. The TV and the rest of the bags; they needed bringing up. He turned swiftly and exited the apartment, closing the front door behind him. ′You made the consequences of lying to you very clear'. Her words echoed as he pounded his feet down the stairs. He hadn't even considered taking the elevator, he needed to move. He thundered in descent in the stairwell, each turn around to the next set of steps jarring his mind a little more. 'I felt like I was dying', Paige's voice came back to him. She had been dying. She was closer to the edge of death than he'd ever managed to successfully bring someone to by the time their rescue party had reached her. He reminded himself of the barbed wire biting at her neck, buried into the flesh. The whip marks across her back, the gnarly tattered skin of her wrists, the smell of Jas's decaying body. As he reached the car his phone vibrated against his thigh, Ant's name appearing on screen. Jase didn't bother with written response, if Ant had landed back in the UK and was awake, they could talk.

"Hey man, how's it going?" Jase squinted in the glare of the low late afternoon sun.

"Hey, not bad. Just about to do formal debriefing and hopefully get a decent kip," Ant replied. "How's Paige doing?"

"She's okay," Jase answered, unsure if that was really the truth. He leaned against the side of the car, exhaling deeply in conflict. "She can't stand me, obviously. I'm trying, but I'm not sure what I can do to change that."

"That's a tough one," Ant sighed through the phone. "Just... give it time."

"Yeah," Jase chewed his lip a little, after all, there was no other solution. "Alright man, enjoy getting your ass chewed out. I've got to carry a TV."

The unproductive conversation helped Jase immeasurably. He wasn't even certain why he'd called Ant, but speaking with someone who understood the situation was something of a relief, even if it didn't directly assist his current predicament. Jase hated the uneasiness in the depths of his stomach. He was used to being able to solve problems, but he couldn't fix this.