Realm Wraith (32 page)

Another man sat inside his office. He jumped when Rayne pushed the door open, fumbling for papers that spilled off his desk. Rayne didn’t recognize him.

“I’m sorry, I think you have the wrong room,” the man said.

“No, this is my office. I’m just here to get some papers.”

The stranger looked at Rayne’s wheelchair, his face flashing with pity, to Rayne’s chagrin. “Oh, oh my, they said nobody was using this room and put me in here. I didn’t know you were coming back.”

“Not yet. But you shouldn’t get too comfortable.”

Rayne flipped through a file cabinet and pulled out the folder he wanted, retreating while the stranger watched, not offering to help him. The man seemed flustered by the awkward situation. Rayne shut the door behind him, and started back towards the elevator.

“Ah, Mercer, a moment?” Mr. Bastley strolled down the hall and motioned to him, pointing to an adjacent meeting room.

Wondering why his boss wanted to see him, Rayne turned around and rolled into the room, a spacious, rectangular room bordered on one wall by a massive window overlooking the city, and a glass partition with a less splendid view of the hallway. It was decorated enough to be comfortable, with some fake plants and framed photographs, but the only other furniture of note was a meeting table meant for many people to sit down around. With just the two of them, the table went unused, as Rayne rolled himself beside it, while Mr. Bastley chose to stand.

“I wasn’t expecting to see you back here. But it saves me a phone call,” his boss began.

Rayne’s heart slowed, and the atmosphere in the air chilled, as he knew deep down this wasn’t going to be a pleasant conversation.

“Mercer, we run a very tight ship here. Everything in its place, everything organized, and our clients know they can count on us to do the job they hire us to.”

“Yes, I believe that too.”

“That’s why I’m concerned about your current situation.” He gestured towards Rayne.

“Are you saying I can’t do my job because I can’t walk? That’s discrimination!”

“Calm down, of course not,” Bastley said, though by the way he shifted his eyes, Rayne suspected it was a factor. “I’m referring to your mental state. I heard about your memory problems.”

“How could you know about that?”

“At this firm we make it our business to know everything about our employees.”

It didn’t really surprise Rayne that they’d somehow accessed his medical records, but he felt violated all the same. He put the folder on the table and tried to stay calm.

“Look, it’s just a temporary situation; it has no bearing on my ability to do my job.”

“I’m not going to argue that you weren’t a fine solicitor. But you can’t expect to convince me that your mind is still sharp so soon after a traumatic experience like that.”

“If you want me to take more time off I can, but I can assure you I’m no different than I was three months ago. It’s not as if I planned to get in a car accident.”

“I am aware of that. But sometimes life is just unfair. And frankly, I don’t think we can afford having you on sick leave for another three months. We’ve brought somebody else on and we’re having them take over your case files. I want you to prepare all your paperwork and make sure you hand everything over.”

“Am I being sacked?”

“Of course not. It would be unethical to let someone go in your ‘situation.’ But I’d prefer your work be handled by more responsible men. Perhaps if you can prove that your head is in the game, we can ease back to the way things were. Once you come back to work, you can use one of the cubicles to do minor tasks, things that won’t strain you. Let everybody else run around on their feet. Of course, if you feel you’re not suited to work here, you can always quit. I’m sure there are plenty of organizations that would welcome you.”

How sleazy; Rayne recognized this tactic. By taking him off his casework, they could demote him without the legal quagmire of sacking him, making his work life bad enough to force him to quit. He finally understood what he’d been too busy to grasp before now, that he was just a replaceable cog in a machine. They didn’t admire him because of his skill. They admired his ability to play along, and not cause a fuss. Once things became more complicated, his usefulness to them dwindled. And yet after all his hard work, being told to just abandon it stung deep. He had to have some value to them.

“My memory’s not that bad,” he argued. “The doctor said it’s only temporary, and I can remember every case I’ve worked with in the last five years. I promise I can still do my job.”

“Please don’t demean yourself by begging. This isn’t the end of the line. I’m sure we can find some use for you, just not working with clients.”

“But this is my life, my—” Rayne’s mind searched his foggy past, desperate. In his head he saw the vaguest image of his father, and a bare understanding that his whole career had begun with this man, who wanted nothing less for his son. “You can’t just bully me out—”

“I assure you, nobody at this firm is ‘bullying’ you, Mercer. We are lawyers, not a group of thugs. It’s just business.”

A group of thugs. The notion pushed another vision into Rayne’s mind, the faceless form of somebody who had wronged him. His mind whirred, gears shifting, cogs turning. He held out his hand and found a missing piece of the puzzle his past had become.

“There were others,” he gasped.

Mr. Bastley had no way of knowing what Rayne was talking about. “I think we’re done here. I can arrange an escort if you can’t leave of your own power.”

It came back to Rayne bit by bit, mere shadows at first. His visions flashed as if lit by bolts of lighting. He saw his tormentor, not a face, just a vague, blurry form. But Rayne remembered his grin, the way he flashed so many teeth. He was like a grinning skull, devoid of mercy—a bully through and through. Everything had to be the way
he
wanted it, and so many others lived in fear of his wrath. Anybody who stood up to him, who even thought about doing things their own way, was an enemy. And Rayne found himself in this monster’s cross-hairs. There could be no peace between them. Rayne was constantly attacked—the street, the schoolyard, nowhere was safe. But Rayne never backed down. He never told on the boy, or asked for help. He couldn’t recall why. He always stood and fought, and there was never a clear winner to their childish battles. Then something had changed. Rayne still couldn’t remember faces, but in his mind he heard childish laughter, and saw bodies with darkened heads, only their smiles visible. Other neighborhood children? Rayne remembered the day they surrounded him, and the terrible feeling in his gut as he knew he was sorely outnumbered. It was the bully’s doing; he knew that much. The little tosser had gathered them together as his personal army. What did it matter if he cheated, as long as he won?

“Mercer? Mercer did you hear me?!” Mr. Bastley demanded.

Rayne ignored him, drowning in his own distorted past. He remembered the brutality as he was beaten senseless by too many enemies to count. When he could fight no longer, the bully appeared to him, laughing at his own triumph. Rayne remembered being tied up so tightly he couldn’t move, and taken away. The others just watched. They had no reason to help him, after all. Everything went dark, and Rayne found himself shoved into a small sack and dragged around. He heard nothing beyond his tormentor’s mocking laughter. Then came the pit. Rayne fell a great distance, deep into the earth. He could see just a tiny sliver in the darkness, enough to watch as soil closed in around him, burying him deeper and deeper. It was hot down here, suffocating. Beads of sweat dripped down Rayne’s face as the memory overwhelmed him. He remembered the crushing pressure as the experience swallowed his mind. He could almost smell the dirt, feel it closing up his throat. Fire enveloped him, torching him, searing his flesh, and he started to scream.

“Let me out! Please, for the love of God, let me out! Don’t do this!
You arsehole! I’ll kill you!
Let me out of here, now! Please!
” The wheelchair toppled over when he flailed his arms, and he went crashing to the floor. He laid there, twitching.

Mr. Bastley watched Rayne as if he were a mental patient, unwilling to help him. He didn’t seem to know how to react to the sudden outburst. Rayne’s eyes focused on the wheelchair in front of him, and he saw his boss just staring at him. He kept shivering, a haunted look in his eyes as the memory still clung to his mind.

“That son of a bitch,” he whispered, his voice no more than a strangled rasp. “He buried me alive.”

His anger choked his soul, but he tried to regain some composure, remembering he wasn’t alone, and he’d already made a fool of himself. Mr. Bastley bent down and yanked him up, helping him back into the chair. Rayne slumped there, haunted by the very clear memory. He drew in breath and exhaled. It came out as a white mist that hung in the air, then dissipated. A strange placidity swept over him, and he sat very still. His mind focused now, as he began to mull over the meaning behind his newly recovered memory.

“If I ever find that bastard,” he said, coldness creeping into his voice, “I will break every bone and organ in his body. He will beg me for mercy.”

“Mercer, what the
hell
is the matter with you?” Mr. Bastley demanded, inching towards the phone on the table. “This behavior is completely unacceptable! After all our firm did for you— I cannot employ someone so obviously disturbed! If I were you, I would highly consider therapy!”

Rayne’s gaze now raised itself up, and that eerie stillness still gripped him, as if the world around him had slowed. “Are you a religious man, Mr. Bastley?”

“I don’t see how that matters.”

Rayne stared off into space. A cold, dark feeling intensified inside him, a feeling he embraced now. His anger had frozen, solidifying into something far more dangerous. A very chilled sense of wrath. “Do you believe in God, or the afterlife?” More vapor hung from his lips as he continued to breathe. “Or perhaps the Devil?”

“I want you out of this building before I call security,” Mr. Bastley said. Despite this, he never reached for the phone, nor could he look away from Rayne’s stare. He shook, but that was the only movement he made.

“It’s frightening to think about.” Rayne looked his superior right in the eyes. “Did you ever consider the possibility that there might be a hell? And that if you make one simple, stupid, forgettable mistake, you might have to spend the rest of your existence there?”

“Was that a threat? We do not tolerate threats at Bastley and Stockwell!” Mr. Bastley tried to meet Rayne’s eye, to maintain contact and a sense of assertiveness, but the latter’s intensity made him nervous. He reached for the phone, picking up the receiver and fumbling for buttons as he maintained eye-contact. “L-look, you’re obviously not in your right mind. But you’re not fit to work here. You never were. Why don’t you go home, get some sleep, and perhaps I will consider not pressing charges.”

“Sleep?” Rayne laughed: a mocking, twisted sound. “Sleep won’t help me. Sleep will only make things worse!”

“Then seek counseling!” Mr. Bastley lifted up the phone receiver. “Hello? Is there anyone on the line? I need security up here—Hello?”

“It worms into your brain, doesn’t it?” Rayne murmured, leaning forward. “The things you’ve done to get where you are. Like that family of five you evicted from their house because your client needed to build that car park. Or that stubborn company that refused to negotiate a buyout. But you had pictures. Just a little nudging, and next thing you know, you’ve gotten them to sign that shiny new paper that makes your client so happy.”

The phone dropped from Mr. Bastley’s hand. “How—”

“It never bothered you, did it? They were in the way, and you were only doing your job. But there’s always that one small fear. You dread that moment you become obsolete, and the tables turn. You pretend things are normal. It’s just ‘business,’ after all. But you cling to that fear, while you despair that the cruelty of the universe is all that there is, and it only toys with you as its little plaything. Time is your worst enemy. No small wonder you drink.”

Mr. Bastley’s eyes widened a little. “I-I don’t know what you mean,” he stammered.

“I think you do.” Rayne’s voice became a menacing hiss, as he felt a wondrous thrill from putting his boss on edge. He welcomed the relief it gave him to let out his frustrations by spreading fear and uneasiness. “The ones that do truly horrible things get what they deserve in the end.”

Mr. Bastley let out a wretched gasp. Maddened fear consumed his gaze as he looked into Rayne’s eyes, as if he saw something he wasn’t meant to. He scrambled backwards, toppling over one of the chairs and knocking himself off-balance. He crawled around on the floor like a panicked wretch.

“Absolutely vile,” he gasped. He hunched over, vomiting up on the carpet. Then he stumbled onto his feet and rushed for the door, fumbling to open it. “S-stay away from me!
Get away
!” He pulled the door open and rushed out, slamming it behind him. Rayne sat, alone in the meeting room, still possessed by that eerie, quiet sensation. He turned his head to his left, towards the wall of windows, and the reflections inside them growing clearer as the sun set outside.

For only a moment, he saw a flash of a face, his face, haunted and deformed into something horrifying. Eyes, white like a frozen corpse, wide smile with lips pulled back, filled with cruelty. The vision made his heart stop, even as it relaxed to the face he saw every day. Then the vision in the window changed, from a twilight cityscape to a ruined madness, filled with screaming demons and all-consuming darkness. A vision that echoed in his own eyes. He recognized it all, as he saw it every night. Mr. Bastley, he realized, had seen that same insanity, but it was not as familiar to him.