CHAPTER FIVE
Wickie woke up again fully dressed, lying on an examining table set up in a corner of the white room. The woman in the red dashiki sat primly a few feet away, her hands resting lightly on her knees. She looked tired, as if she was at the end of a long day that wouldn’t stop.
“Welcome, Mr. Starczynski.”
He expected a hangover, or at least some kind of headache, after being drugged. But his mind was clear, and he actually felt pretty good, considering. He sat up smoothly and looked down at himself. Shirt and pants; a different style from the one he was used to, but the colors, brown and green, were agreeable. He wore soft slippers instead of shoes. That told him he wasn’t expected to go anywhere. But the place didn’t stink like jail, and it didn’t look like jail, either.
He took a long appraising look around.
Over at the other end of the room, past the single door, was the bed, the machinery, the stairs, the observation deck— all the things he’d seen before he’d been gassed to sleep. Opposite him was the woman. There was no one else in the room.
He looked at her and waited, patient and suspicious. She bore his gaze with equanimity. If he tried anything, he guessed, they’d just gas him again. And even if he could
get out of here, where would he go?
“My name is Dr. Verbeena Beeks,” she said. “You’re probably wondering what’s happened to you.”
He snorted softly to himself, kept his face impassive.
She waited to see if he’d ask any questions. When he kept quiet, she went on.
“The first thing is, we’re really sorry you’re here. You have no idea how sorry.” She drew in a breath. She couldn’t possibly sit up any straighter. She looked like a picture in one of Bethica’s books, a picture of a queen of some place in Africa. “You’ve accidentally become involved in an experiment that’s gone wrong. It’s our sincere hope that very shortly you’ll return to your proper place. It would help us if you’d tell us everything you can about yourself and the people you know.”
Wickie thought about this. Experiment? That sounded like the government. She was holding something back, of course. There was more to the story. He looked down at his hands, clutching the edge of the examining table, and he didn’t recognize them at all.
He wondered how much she wasn’t telling him, and decided to see if he could find out. “What kind of experiment?”
“It’s an experiment in quantum physics,” she said.
Uncertainty. She wasn’t all that sure about this part herself. But physics, that was government, for sure.
“The result is that you’ve .. . switched places . .. with one of our people. He has to take certain actions. Once he does, you’ll switch back, and you probably won’t remember anything about this.” She wasn’t sure about that, either, he could tell.
Switched places. He lifted his right hand, rotated it, examined it. It was too pale, and there wasn’t any scar across the heel of his hand.
Not his hand.
Switched places.
Demons stole people’s souls, his mother had told him. They came in the night, creatures with twisted faces, and they took people away and they were never seen again. He never really believed that stuff. This black woman, she didn’t look like a demon. This place didn’t look like any version of Hell he’d ever heard about.
Still. Not his hand. Witchcraft.
He clenched “his” fist, watching fascinated as the hand that was not his hand moved and tightened. It felt like his hand felt—strong, the muscles moving and shifting; the nails biting into the palm brought the same edged pain. But his hands weren’t so big, so white. He suppressed a shudder of panic. He wouldn’t let this woman see him be afraid.
She’d said something about switching back, if—He had to have more information. He had to. Not really expecting an answer, he asked, “What actions?”
Abruptly, she looked exasperated and much more human. “I don’t know. Nobody knows. We’re trying to figure that out. That’s why we need information from you.”
“Well, if you don’t know what actions, how do you know I’ll—switch back with this guy?” He was pushing it hard, he knew. He had no reason to think a government person would tell him anything. Government people liked to say things and act superior and they didn’t like questions. But this woman was answering him so far.
She slumped, just the tiniest bit. Definitely not a demon, then; he couldn’t remember any stories where demons looked sad. “Because that’s the way it’s always worked before.”
The past was no guarantee of the future. On the other hand, he didn’t have anything better to go on, and it looked like this doctor woman didn’t either. “This happens a lot, then?”
Dr. Beeks nodded, biting her lip. Demons didn’t do that, either.
“And it always switches back okay?”
She opened her mouth to say something, then stopped. He watched with interest, waiting for the signs that she was going to lie to him.
The signs didn’t come. “Once a man switched back in
time to die,” she said. “We can’t control that. But mostly everything goes back okay. Better than it was before.”
He looked back down at his pale hand. Switching back was better?
Better than being stuck behind a bar, watching the white kids reach for what he’d never had?
The black woman had said so.
And it was better to be yourself, always. His mother had told him that, back when he was young and foolish and wondered who he really was, when his cousins on each side of the family made fun of him for being part of the other.
He raised the unfamiliar hand. “Who is this man?”
She hesitated. Now the lies would come. But instead, she said, “I’m sorry. I can’t tell you that, because if we succeed in switching you back, we can’t let you remember any of this.”
He grinned then, a tight unpleasant grin. “Afraid I might go looking for him
