The Big O and all of its settings and characters are owned by Bandai Visual, Sunrise, and Cartoon Network.

THE BIG O:

ACT 35

ROGER THE DARK KNIGHT

Chapter Eleven: What You Can't Have

Back on the street, Roger and Dorothy looked at Dastun expectantly. "Well?" the negotiator asked.

Dastun took the radio from his ear. "He hung up on me," he smiled.

"Am I going to have a driver's license when all of this is over?" Roger asked.

"Don't sweat it Roger," Dastun made a dismissive gesture. "It's not like we caught you with a known fugitive or anything. I'll just tell them that you agreed to participate in a drill or something. That's it, I'll say this was all a security exercise and I hired you to put the men through their paces. I am in charge of the military police ya know. If Lester Young wants me to bring you in he's got my phone number." Dastun took a box of cigarettes out of his pockets and lit up. "So where's your butler anyway? Smuggling Angel out a secret entrance?"

"Nothing of the kind, colonel," Roger winked. "He's out doing the grocery shopping. If any of your men have my home staked out, they'll sure to see Norman drive home on his motorcycle with a sidecar full of groceries."

"So he's stopping by the store on his way home?" Dastun winked back. "Smooth. Take care of yourself Roger and don't leave town." It was the oldest joke a cop could tell. Aside of Paradigm City there was almost no place to go.

Dastun walked back to the military police vehicles, and they started up and drove away. Roger and Dorothy got back in the Cadillac and returned home to some much needed peace and quiet. Finally they had the house to themselves again. Angel was gone.

Roger frowned. Angel was gone. He might never see her again! He glanced over at Dorothy who was still wearing the pink jacket. Angel was gone and he never…

The pained look on his face wasn't lost on Dorothy, who hadn't said a word after their meeting with Dastun. "Do you miss her Roger?" the girl asked pointblank.

"Huh?" Roger started. "Yes, of course I do. I'm worried about her. With both Beck and Lester Young after her I don't know how long she'll last out there. She's in something that's too big for her, and it's not about being a former agent of the Union. Do you think that story she told about a repository of lost…"

"Are you in love with her, Roger?" Dorothy asked in the same tone as before.

"Wow, you sure know how to go for the throat, don't you?" Roger shook his head and walked away. He entered a room that had been furnished to create his own private bar.

"You didn't answer my question," said the unrelenting machine as she followed him and took off her pink jacket.

"It's kind of a personal question, isn't it?" he snorted as he opened a cabinet and pulled out a glass tumbler.

"Yes it is," the girl said as she got behind the bar and bent over to pull out a full seltzer bottle. "But we have been asking each other personal questions for the last few months now. I had assumed that our level of intimacy had increased to a point where we were comfortable asking each other these kinds of questions."

Roger chuckled as he sat down at the bar and let Dorothy mix a drink for him. The girl was so analytical! Sometimes it was hard to remember that she wasn't just a girl; she was also an android. "You're right Dorothy Wayneright," he admitted. "We've reached a point in our friendship where we can ask each other such questions, as long as we aren't so pushy that we demand an answer."

"I believe that the answer to my question is important Roger Smith," Dorothy said in the same flat but stern tone. "You need to reveal the answer, to yourself if not to me." She pushed the finished drink across the bar towards him.

"You're right again, Dorothy," he sighed as he held the glass in his hand. "I've been keeping too many secrets from myself lately. Every man has his secrets, but when he can't be honest with himself he loses his identity." He took a sip then frowned and set his glass back on the bar. "Did you put any gin in this?"

"No. You said you'd cut down," Dorothy said.

"Come on, don't I get a chance to relax?" he smiled disarmingly.

"You were abducted last month," Dorothy reminded him. "You yourself told me that you would never have been captured if you had been sober at the time. You said that using alcohol to solve your problems just makes bigger ones."

"Have a heart Dorothy," Roger whined while maintaining his disarming smile. "I just put fifty miles on the car."

"I will add one shot to your drink but only because I don't want you to suffer withdrawal symptoms," she acquiesced.

"How do you even know about withdrawal symptoms?" Roger asked.

"I read."

"I'm still waiting for that shot of gin," he said while sliding his glass on the bar in a circular motion.

"I'm still waiting for an answer to my question," Dorothy retorted. "Do you love her Roger Smith? Are you in love with Angel?"

"You drive a hard bargain," he sighed.

"I live with a professional negotiator," she replied. "I was bound to pick up something eventually. Do you accept my terms?"

"Deal," he sighed again. "This is a question I'm not ready to answer sober."

Dorothy added a shot of gin and waited as Roger sipped his drink. "You aren't answering," she finally said. "That means that either you don't want to tell me or that you don't know the answer yourself."

"Yeah," he nodded sadly. "I don't know if you understand, but sometimes it's hard to tell if you really love someone or if you just want what you can't have."

"I understand," she replied. "I understand intimately."

The next few weeks were quiet. Nobody heard anything out of Beck but that didn't mean that he wasn't planning anything. I wonder… I wonder why he really wants Angel. Is he working for Lester Young? Or is he working for himself? And just what is he going to try next?

In a large hanger Jason Beck and his cohorts were wearing white lab coats, as were the machinists and technicians that were setting up equipment and connecting power cables.

"Okay boss, everything's set!" Dove, the henchman who looked like a clown piped in his high-pitched squeaky voice.

"We're ready t' throw the switch whenever you're ready!" T-bone, the short tubby henchman who usually dressed like a beatnik said in his deeper voice. Even now he still wore his beanie and sunglasses, despite the fact that he was now dressed in a lab coat and scrubs.

"Boys, moments like this should be savored! When Crow-boy sees this he'll flip his lid!" Back crowed as he walked up a flight of stairs to a catwalk where a control console had been set up. "Okay, let's get this show on the road!" He threw a switch and the lights in the hanger flashed on and off. "It's alive! It's alive!" he shrieked before laughing like a madman. He then coughed and clutched at his neck as his throat became sore.

Back at the white tower that was the Smith residence, Roger decided to confront a different creation of man's genius. "Okay, Dorothy. What's going on? Ever since Angel left you've become inexplicitly distant. You do your chores without a word, and when you sit at the table I have to pry a conversation out of you. Something is going on. You've been avoiding me and I had to wait until you were cleaning my room so I could corner you."

"I don't know what you mean," she said as she made his bed. Roger blushed as she bent over and the drape of her skirt displayed the shape of her artificial but adorable behind. Either the original Dorothy had a great caboose, or the little android's creator had some kind of fetish.

"For the last few weeks you've been acting like my maid instead of my guest," Roger said as he crossed his arms and leaned against the doorway. "You haven't even been getting me up with that awful piano music of yours. At first I didn't mind, but now I'm getting worried. You haven't been yourself lately. Is something going on that I should know about?"

She stopped and looked back at him, the servos in her neck audibly humming. "I'm fine, Roger. I really don't know what you mean."

"I mean lately you've been acting like a servant!" Why did Roger raise his voice? Was he really that upset? Why was this so important to him? He coughed into his gloved fist and spoke in a gentler voice. "I know I can be really bossy at times, but believe it or not your opinion matters to me Dorothy."

"Why?" she asked. "I'm only an android. My opinions don't really matter, do they Roger?"

"What kind of nonsense is that?" Roger growled. "Of course they do!"

"I don't see how they would," Dorothy said. "I am completely indebted to you. You allow me to live here and pay all my expenses. I have very little experience with the real world so I have little to no data with which to offer any useful input. I am not technically a living being and as such you have no real obligation to shelter me. The logical conclusion is that I should do what I can to make your life easier and stop interfering with your decisions."

"What are you talking about?" Roger sneered. "That's ridiculous! Where did you get that drivel? 'Little to no data with which to offer any input?' Since when do you talk like that Dorothy?"

"I read."

"Whatever books you're reading, you should stop!" Roger scolded. "Dorothy, you can't deny who you are! This isn't like you! I know sometimes I can be a tyrant but I had hoped that you could at least have your dignity!" Was he panicking? Why was he so upset?

"Don't worry about it," she said. "I don't mind. I can't survive with total freedom and I don't really need dignity. I'll be content to serve and make your life easier. It's better this way."

"Since when do you talk like this Dorothy?" Roger shook his head. "I feel like we've gone back in time to last year. You don't trust me for some reason and you're shutting me out, and I want to know why. Out with it."

Dorothy stood up straight and turned with an unnaturally fluid movement to face the negotiator. "Roger, if you love someone, isn't it normal to want the person you love to be happy?"

"I would think that is a given," Roger shrugged as he crossed his arms and leaned against the wall, "but what makes you think giving me the cold shoulder will make anyone happy?"

"It is obvious that you and Angel share a certain chemistry," the girl replied as she walked past him, forcing him to follow her through the parlor and down the hall. "She has changed a lot since we first met her. She is no longer the treacherous, unreliable woman she was last year. You could never be happy with a mere android, but maybe you could with the new Angel."

"Where did this come from?" Roger laughed nervously. "Since when did you start playing matchmaker?"

"You see me as some kind of child don't you?" Dorothy asked. "Angel is a grown woman, and perhaps the only human woman who understands you. If I'm not able to grow up in your eyes, perhaps she can give you what you're missing in your life."

By now Roger was blushing. He had been thinking that it would be nice if Angel moved in on a permanent basis, for Dorothy's sake of course. The girl needed strong feminine role model, a big sister one could say. Only his experience as a negotiator stopped him from spouting nonsensical drivel until he could collect his thoughts and figure out what he really wanted to say. Best to say something noncommittal until he knew what was going on. "Why Dorothy, I had no idea that the two of you were getting along so well."

"It's not like I can be choosy," Dorothy said as she opened the door to the broom closet. "I don't really have that many friends," she added as she selected a long handled broom and a dust pan before closing the door.

"Well this is an interesting turn of events," Roger smirked. "From the conversations we've been having since the Union's attack I was under the impression that you thought that we should start dating."

"You think of me as a child, remember?" she said with a slight edge to her voice. "You think of me as a dependent. Despite the fact that I have the maturity level that belongs to that dead girl I was modeled after you still think of me as being two years old. You've made it quite clear."

"If you mean I made it quite clear that a gentleman never takes advantage of an innocent girl living under his roof, then than yes, I did," he retorted in the same icy tone.

"Going on a few dates isn't taking advantage Roger," she insisted. "We would just be going out. It might not get that far."

"Hey, it's gotten pretty far already!" he protested. "A lot farther than common decency will allow! Do you have any idea how much you've gotten under my skin lately? I take more cold showers these days than…"

At that moment Norman Burg stepped out of the elevator holding a newspaper. There was an awkward silence before the old man spoke. "Oh my, begging your pardon but am I interrupting anything? I'm certain that this can wait."

"No," Roger shook his head in surrender. "It's okay. I need rescuing anyway. What is it?"

"You asked me to keep an eye on the agony columns in case you missed anything," Norman said as he handed Roger the newspaper. "The code words have appeared in the personal ads. It appears that Miss Angel wishes to meet with you sir."

"Angel," Roger breathed a sigh of relief. "She's safe! Thank goodness!" he smiled as he held the newspaper Norman gave him as if it was a Heaven's Day gift.

Roger and Norman jerked in surprise as a loud CRACK echoed through the hallway. They turned their heads to stare at Dorothy Wayneright, who in turn was looking at the broken broomstick in her hands. She had snapped the broom in two.

"It would appear that I am going out also," the girl said quietly. "I need to buy a new broom."

Elsewhere in the city, Lester Young himself paid a visit the hanger where Beck and the Paradigm mechanics had built the blond criminal's latest creation. "Well Mister Beck I donated the resources and manpower to create your toy. But can you produce the results you promised?"

"Relax Mister Young!" Beck smiled. "It'll be a piece of cake! With this baby in my hands there's nothing to worry about!"

"Somehow Mister Beck I suspect that the opposite is true, but I'm giving you the chance to prove yourself regardless," the portly executive retorted.

"What's the matter? Don't you trust me?" the wily crook smirked.

"That is a question that you already know the answer to Mister Beck," Young sneered. "You insult the both of us merely by asking it."

"Well you can trust me more than Roger Smith," Beck insisted. "That stunt he pulled dressing his android up as Angel was a definite decoy! If you're concerned that I'm wasting your time at least I'm not hindering you like Crow-boy is."

"Is there a point to this innuendo?" Young asked dryly.

"No point, I just wonder how you sleep at night knowing that the guy who controls the black megadeus is actively working against you," Beck shrugged innocently. "I hope for your sake you've got some contingency plans in case he gets even further out of line. If he's planning something, you'll only get one chance before the black megadeus comes down on you."

"Mister Beck, are you trying to convince me to eliminate Roger Smith?" Young asked in a dangerous voice.

"Well he is a potential threat isn't he?" Beck asked. "If he's working for Angel, then we can get rid of the word 'potential'. He is a threat isn't he?"

"Mister Beck, if I eliminated every single person who was a potential threat we would not be having this conversation and you would not be capable of conversing at all," Young enunciated in a stern tone. "Like it or not Roger Smith is the only one who can control the black megadeus and he has always used it to defend Paradigm City and its inhabitants in the past. I would be a fool to dispose of him! I have allowed you to create your toy, and you blatantly try to manipulate me into following your personal agenda. No," he shook his head. "I may be fool enough to build your plaything for you but I am not so much of an ass that I would order my agents to deprive the city of its last line of defense merely at your suggestion! Out of the two of you Roger Smith has proven himself far more dependable that you have sir. I have yet to see you live up to your boasts! Get out of my sight and be thankful that I'm letting you take your creation with you! That's all you're going to get until you get me the Angel! Now go sir! Go! Don't insult me by staying in my presence one more moment!"

"Wow. Touch-ee," Beck muttered as the portly executive turned on his heel and strode out of the hangar. "Roger Smith is more reliable that I am huh? We'll see about that!" he snickered. "He's about to find out just what Roger Smith is really made of!"

On a desk filled with hourglasses a phone rings. Roger's hand picks up the receiver and a sinister voice says:

Next: I've Got Your Number