Spy Vs. Spy

Did John Brown peer into the future that lay seconds ahead of him? Was he able to imagine what it would be like? Did he consider that he may cease to exist? Was this impossible for him to understand? Was his courageous exterior corresponded to by an interior courage? Did he really fear nothing, as his calm and unimpassioned body seemed to indicate? Was he more concerned with the gallows, or his legacy, and the earthly change it would bring about?

Four walls. John Brown on a bed. Four walls. A doctor in a white coat. Four walls. A clean look to the room. Four walls, four naked walls.

Is your Gog and Magog rather hilarious in winter?

What?

Is your, well, shining, which caries three, also bright?

I don't understand.

The doctor sighs.

I see you're not ready for complex communication. I shall have to speak to you as if you were a child.

A confused look. Where am I?

The White.

The White?

Yes. Well, a psychological treatment center, really. Within the White.

What am I doing here?

You don't remember?

Not a thing.

What's your name?

John Brown.

And what do you do for a living?

I don't know.

How long have you been here?

I don't know.

How old are you?

Fifties. Fifty something.

Well, you're here for us to help you get your mind back, which you've lost. You're a spy. A triple agent, really. You act as a double agent for the Antiwhite. You work for the White, while pretending to be a spy for them who's pretending to be a spy for us.

What?

They've erased your memory. Nothing to worry about, just put a block in it, really. It's all still there inside your brain. When it comes back, it will come back in full.

I'm a spy?

Yes. For the White. Against the Antiwhite.

Only they think . . .

Only the Antiwhite think you're a spy for the Antiwhite pretending to be a spy for the White.

And why did they . . .

They caught you. Erased your memory. One of our quadruple agents took those fellows out, however, and destroyed the evidence. So you have recovered your cover. Once you get your memory back, you'll go right into the action all over again.

As a spy for the White pretending to be a spy for the Antiwhite pretending to be a spy for the White.

Exactly.

How do you know that, well, to be simple, that I'm not really working for the Antiwhite, and there's one more step to it?

Oh, we know everything. Let me ask you, Are your thoughts in lines, or globes?

Lines.

Typical. Actually, under the surface, all concepts are globes. You know, a simple, non-linear awareness of information, wordless. Might I try changing your thoughts?

Sure.

It's all in the rehabilitation process.

The doctor carefully slices a spot on John Brown's brain with a laser. He deftly melds two small sections of the brain together.

A divine and strangely personal smell.

What?

How does that strike you?

Yes . . . a divine and . . . my thoughts seem rather like globes now.

Yes. Can you tell me what you do for a living?

I'm a slavery abolitionist.

Yes. And how do you survive doing that full-time?

I raise money, mostly in Boston, for slavery abolition, then try to free slaves in Missouri, Virginia. It's my whole goal in life.

And why do you obsess on this goal?

Slavery is evil.

Yes. As are a lot of things. Hunger. House fires. Environmental destruction. Mistreatment of animals. There are always evils.

Yes. Indeed there are.

Then why dedicate your life to ending an evil? Most people don't feel such responsibility.

I . . . I just felt it was my mission.

It was your reason for existence.

Yes.

Well, that was your cover anyway.

What?

Oh. You were supposed to actually believe your cover was really true. So that you wouldn't slip up.

You mean my abolitionism was just a front? And I didn't even know it?

Of course. There really is no need to dedicate one's life to ending evils. Evils are all around us. Any sensible person would simply try to avoid them as he goes about making a living. Or at the most refuse to contribute to an evil like slavery. It would be pointless to dedicate one's life to ending the world's imperfections.

But I believed it was my mission.

Of course. You must believe your cover. How will you be convincing to the enemy if you don't? Here, let me try this.

The doctor takes a vial of liquid and injects it into John Brown's brain.

Oh. Yes. How foolish, throwing myself upon such matters. There was a greater reason. A deeper reason.

Of course. You'll be better soon.

I hope so doctor.

Oh, don't worry, you will, you will.

A hallway, leading to: a dining room with two violins. A young man playing one of the violins. A piano beside. Chairs, tables and chairs. Tiles making up the floor. John Brown casually picks up the other violin and tries to play, but doesn't know how.

Ten gallons of nothing.

The young man sets down the violin.

The air is rare.

The beef is bloody.

Indeed, indeed. Say, I have a message for you.

From who?

The young man speaks with a whisper.

From the Black.

The Antiwhite?

No. The Black.

What's the message?

You're a quadruple agent. The Antiblack is trying to make you believe you work for them.

Here in this hospital?

Yes.

And I really work for the Antiwhite?

No. For the Black. Against the Antiblack.

The young man goes on playing his violin.

The mad batter hit a homer.

The Greeks and their fried pastries.

I don't get a good sense of that food.

Cuisine, French cuisine.

Ha! ha! ha! he! he! he! hi! hi! hi! ho! ho! ho! hur! hur! hur! hy! hy! hy!

John Brown walks up to the machine.

What is it?

It's a very dangerous machine.

What does it do?

It shouldn't be touched.

The doctor leaves John Brown alone in the room with the dangerous machine.

John Brown presses a button. He presses another. The doctor returns. He ties John Brown to the floor, with ropes extending from his wrists and ankles. Two men pull on the rope tied to his left arm, and two men pull on the rope tied to his right.

What is it?

It's a very dangerous machine. It shouldn't be touched.

What does it do?

Very dangerous things.

Two men pull on John Brown's left ankle rope, and two men pull on his right.

I pressed some buttons.

You did?

Yes.

Well, no wonder.

Why are these men pulling me apart?

Because it's a dangerous thing to pull you apart.

And dangerous things must happen when you press buttons on the dangerous machine?

Exactly. Tell me. What did the violin player tell you?

That I work for the Black.

You mean the Antiwhite.

He said the Black.

Did he tell you you were a double agent?

No. A quadruple agent.

Very well.

These men are pulling me limb from limb.

They will stop short of that.

How do you know?

You didn't press the most dangerous button on the dangerous machine.

The men cease pulling on John Brown's limbs. He is untied, and again left alone with the dangerous machine.

He feels an incredible urge to press more buttons on the dangerous machine. He resists the urge successfully.

He stares out a window which shows him a hall. He looks at an angle so he can see a room at the end of the hall. There is something he can't quite make out (the room is dimly lit). He suddenly makes out the form of the violin player hanging dead by the neck.

He feels such an incredible urge to press buttons on the dangerous machine. He resists the urge.

The doctor comes in.

You're coming along well.

I didn't press any more buttons.

I know.

John Brown's fingers are punctured with needles, each fingerend bleeding.

Why did that happen?

You failed to press the correct buttons on the dangerous machine.

Strings are thread through the fingerends. Short little men control his hands with the strings.

Now. We shall press the correct buttons on the dangerous machine.

John Brown's fingers press a series of buttons on the machine. His fingers are controlled by the men holding the strings.

He presses buttons, presses buttons, and the machine's danger is circumvented successfully.

It must be treated with care. It's a very dangerous machine.

Did John Brown wonder what he was at his core? Did it seem strange, these things that were happening to him? Did a false mustache and nose grow from his face? Was he a master of disguise? Did he have many secret pens and eyeglasses and cars? Did the intrigue run especially deep? Did he know? What?

John Brown wanders the halls. He opens a door to a flight of stairs. He goes down the stairs. He decides he must free some slaves. He decides it is his cover that he must free some slaves. Then he decides it is his cover that it is his cover that it is his cover that . . . he opens a door at the bottom of the stairs. Inside is a room with a white slave, and a black slave, both chained to a wall. He reaches into his pocket and finds a key. It is a master key. He unlocks the chain of the white slave, and unlocks the chain of the black slave. The black slave reaches into his clothes and gives John Brown a disk; the white slave gives him a file. They disappear out a door. John Brown opens the file. It says THIS FILE WILL EXPLODE. John Brown sets down the disk and file and leaves the room, going back up the stairs. He hears the file explode.

A nice cushy couch, brown. A desk with some papers. Carpet floor.

John Brown sits on the couch, opposite the doctor.

I think I know what's going on.

What?

I'm crazy. I'm suffering delusions that I'm just a crazy person.

You are indeed.

What?

You are a quadruple agent. But you have gone crazy. You suffer the delusion that your life is normal, when in reality you are a secret spy, and constantly in danger. Your life is gravely important. You should have kept the disk; it wouldn't have exploded.

So I must accept that I am indeed a spy, and then I'll be cured.

Exactly.

But what about freeing the slaves?

It is meaningless to free the slaves. There is evil everywhere, and always will be. We've gone over this . . .

What was on the disk?

The disk contained a secret. The secret was the very nature of the White and the Antiwhite.

And the Black and the Antiblack as well?

That information is mutually exclusive. To put it on a single disk . . . well, the data would cancel itself out.

So my mission is to find the nature of the White and the Antiwhite.

And the Black and the Antiblack as well, though you mustn't ever think of them at the same time.

Which do I work for?

You work for the Black against the Antiblack.

But what you said before was . . .

That was a test of your memory. Had you remembered the nature of the Work, you would have reacted differently.

What is the Work?

It is what you have been resurrected into.

After my hanging?

Yes. It was a brave death.

And what is the Work, really?

That even I don't know.

John Brown walks the halls. He knocks on a door: two quick knocks, then three long ones. The door opens to an elderly gentleman.

Bye bye, by the by.

By the way.

I have information. About the Antiblack.

What does it pertain to?

The very core of the Work.

Its genuine nature?

Exactly.

What is it?

You must walk down into the basement of the hospital. There you will find door number 7. You must walk through door number 7.

John Brown hears these words echo in the brain as he wanders down the stairs, and sees a door with a 7. He wanders down a long corridor. At its end is another door. He opens the door. It is a room with nothing in it. He wanders out yet another door, and finds another room with nothing. He goes on like this for hours, for days, going from room-with-nothing to room-with-nothing. He wanders forever from nothing to nothing.

End