Jonathan Taylor - Meyer-Hofmann AG

Heinz Hofmann prepared himself for another night in the basement of the Company’s club in the Odeonsplatz . He had insisted that they make no fuss, and was bunking in one of the guard’s rooms on a portable steel bed. He had thought about a hotel outside of the city, but that would mean a commute that he was keen to avoid. The club provided him with everything he needed, food, water, and a bed. All that, and access to all the Company’s records. He had taken to studying them long into the night, as the nights were the worst. Sitting in the interrogation room, leaning against the chair with a needle in his right arm, the doctor standing over him, he was feeling anything but confident about the final outcome of his metamorphosis.

“Why is this taking so long, Doctor? Shouldn’t Jarvis be losing touch by now?”

“This is not an exact science, Herr Hofmann. You must be patient.”

“I have no time for patience. There is too much to be done—I don’t have time for this shit. Can’t you just up the dosage or something?”

“It is not a question of the dosage, but finding the best strain of the virus to change the DNA and destroy his memory synapses. It would seem that Jarvis’s memory has wired itself unconventionally. It should be responding to treatment, but it appears to have multiple synapses to the same memory chain. As we destroy one, it opens another. I believe that your old memory is almost totally regenerated. The problem is, that Jarvis’s memory has not been destroyed. He must have suffered some very intense emotional trauma in early life; that is the only explanation for all this. Extreme emotional arousal can cause memories to become far more intense and deep-rooted.”

“And what are you going to do about it?”

Ecker bent over to take the needle out of Hofmann’s left arm; as he did, Hofmann grabbed his arm, squeezing down with enormous force.

“Aghh, Herr Hofmann!” Ecker bleated.

“Listen to me, Furtner. Get this sorted, and get it sorted quickly—nobody is irreplaceable!”

“I will, I will. Tomorrow, I want to try four new strains. We will get this done. We will defeat him. Trust me, please.”

Hofmann released him, and Ecker stumbled backwards, rubbing his left arm as he went. Then, regaining his composure, he straightened himself.

“Herr Hofmann, the human brain is capable of housing anything up to a 1,000 terabytes of memory, and has over a trillion synaptic connections. It is not a simple rewiring job! The neurons in Jarvis’s brain are creating new synapses, connecting your memories and forgetting his. They have been responsible for your rebirth, but if you feel you have someone better qualified… ” Ecker didn’t wait for a reply. Leaving Hofmann with the needle still in his arm, he turned and left the room.

Hofmann ripped the offending tubes from his arm, hurling the intravenous drip to the floor before taking off after Ecker. As Hofmann came slamming through the door, the doctor had hardly a chance to turn before Hofmann was on him. He hooked his right leg around the doctor’s legs and shoved him hard in the back, and Ecker hit the ground like a Canadian redwood. Grabbing the back of his hair, Hofmann pulled his head back, before smashing it sharply into the floor, producing an audible snap as the doctor’s nose broke. Enraged, Hofmann growled into Ecker’s left ear.

“Don’t underestimate me, Ecker. Furtner will soon be reanimated, and then I can get rid of your sorry arse!”

Releasing the doctor’s hair, Hofmann stood and walked casually down the hall towards his room, ignoring Von Klitzing and two guards who were sprinting in his direction.

“What happened?” Von Klitzing asked.

“The doctor came face-to-face with his new reality.”

With that, Hofmann turned the corner and disappeared into his room, leaving Von Klitzing turning back and forth between the closed door and the dishevelled, bloodied figure of Dr Ecker.

Hofmann lay on the bed, exhausted, his arm still throbbing where he had ripped the needle from his vein. He watched the luminous alarm clock’s green display light bouncing back off the ceiling, its hypnotic effect pushing him towards a dark sleep’s cold embrace. The dream came instantaneously and was a mixture of both his past and Jarvis’s present firing simultaneously, a kaleidoscope of thoughts and images vying for ascendancy. Hofmann could feel the other man’s presence even as he dreamt, a spectre at his back. Together, they visited his childhood, intimate moments with his mother in the kitchen of the family’s first house. A small boy’s first school day, and a proud mother clasping her son’s face in both hands, fortifying him for the day ahead with a kiss on the forehead. Hofmann felt angry that Jarvis should become privy to such a vulnerable moment from his past. But it was not long before they were transported from his mother’s kitchen to the German Reichstag in Berlin, and Hofmann’s first meeting with the newly elected Führer. Huge red banners adorned with black swastika hung on the walls, framing the men’s embrace, both pumped with national pride and radiating the power they now held in their hands. This was a scene he was pleased for Jarvis to share. Then the picture blurred, and the walls seemed to elongate themselves, turning the Reichstag into a white hall, and, finally, a hospital ward. Complete with beds and curtains, it was totally devoid of patients. Only the soft crying resonating from the end of the ward, from behind a pea green door next to the main entrance, alerted them to the presence of a young girl. They were drawn to her like a moth to a flame. Both were aware that this was a part of Hofmann’s past he did not wish to share. The door was now in front of them and opening of its own accord. The room behind it was small, with a bed in the corner, and next to it was a hospital table holding a bank of old-fashioned electronics. The compulsory curtain was half-drawn around the bed so that you could make out a figure curled up at one end of the bed. She was wearing a hospital gown, which revealed a malnourished pubescent body. Her vertebrae and ribs were clearly visible through paper-thin, pale skin. A mop of greasy hair stuck to her shoulders and back. The gown, loosely tied with three thick cotton bands of material, could not protect her modesty. The girl was facing towards the wall so that they could not see her face, but Hofmann knew who it was. The rebirth policy had demanded that all of the chosen board members should parent a male child. With one exception, this was done by artificial insemination. He had been the exception. Choosing the prospective mother himself, he had deemed it his duty to impregnate her the natural way, devoting two weeks to the cause. He had visited the girl every evening after business hours. They had been given the nurse’s station room, and every evening, without fail, she had been there. All of the girls had been chosen from the local Hitler youth, the indoctrinated girls all keen to support the cause. These men were all heroes in their eyes, confidants of the Führer. It was an honour. She had been submissive, even happy the first few times, he remembered. But that had soon changed when he allowed his deviant nature to get the better of him. The last week of their partnership, she had dissolved into the whinging, whining mess that sat before them.

Michael listened to the man’s thoughts and watched his memories. He recognised the sound of the girl’s voice from the apartment.

That is why the neighbours knew nothing about her.

He had almost forgotten her pleading voice in the madness that had become his life.

She turned to face them, terror in her eyes, her legs working frantically to move away from him, pressing her up into the corner of the bed against the walls. Her hands pushed at the bed sheets, her eyes looking at the ceiling for some salvation. Michael felt his arm raise, poised to hit her. An all-consuming desire to teach her her place.