WPCA - Just Business

The door flung back on its hinges crying out in a deranged squeal. A man came through, bobbing as he held onto a pair of zap-strapped legs that jerked back and forth. A second man appeared, hanging on precariously to the shoulders as the bound figure spasmed and jerked. Muffled screams from behind a gag mimed the doors previous cry while tears ran in rivulets beneath the awning of a blindfold.

Unceremoniously, the bound figure is lumped into a corner like trash and kicked several times for emphasis as to who is in charge while the second grabs a chair, noting their captive assuming the foetal position. The chair is set up while the gag and blindfold are removed, revealing a sobbing, weeping man in his mid-thirties. "Up," one says, partially hefting the figure onto the chair who keeps repeating "please, pleas no" in hypnotic mantra.

"You know why you're here?"

"Please, I didn't mean it. It wasn't my fault!"

A fist connects with the side of the bound mans face, rocking him in the chair, but not falling him.

"Look, you dumb shit, answer the fucking questions, or I get the bolt cutters and pretend I do fuck-damned manicures. Got me? Now shit-for-brains, why are you here?"

"I do- I don't know."

Another hit. "You know why! Tell me why, tard-face!"

"I-," he gulps, blood drooling from the side of his head while tears pool in the crook of his eyes. "I told the cops about Blacklight."

"You told the cops about Blacklight. And you know what we do about that, don't you, Randal, right?"

Another gulp, a nod as eyes turn to downcast, trembling orbs half hidden in tears, lashes and lids.

---

He thumbed the device up against the mans forehead. It unfurled, twined wings wrapping around the front of his skull.

"It's a Gurdak," he said nonchalantly, conversationally. The other man, strapped to the chair, was sweating.

"I know Gurdak. Doctor Gurdak."

"Yes, and now you'll begin feeling the pain, as the nanites drill through your skull, begin to envelop your brain. Neuron by neuron, synapse by synapse, you are being copied. In the end, your brain is gone. All that's left is a flesh-like spongy mass of nanites pretending to be you. And you know what, I hear that Gurdakites still believe themselves to be, well, themselves."

He began to scream, beg, plead.

"It's okay. Hush, hush. The pain will go away. You didn't want to talk, we don't need you to talk. Instead, your copy will."

A heart-rate monitor was spiking, crying out in sync to the man strapped to the chair. After minutes that seemed like hours, he drew into silence. Compelled by his rewritten mind.

Reaching a hand forward, he thumbed the button on the front of the skull, the wings retracting. He yanked and what looked like gore-dusted nets slipped out from the newly drilled holes.

A flick caused the last flecks of a mind to sputter off onto the floor while he thumbed the bead again. The nets expanded, forming the mind that had been devoured. He turned it over, this way and that, looking at it, inspecting it. A human mind, digitized in complete.