Chapter 6

…Half a Dozen of the Other

A/N: Here's why I put in that warning at the beginning of the first chapter…unfortunately, you won't find out until near the end of this chapter.
The bell above the door to a Village flower shop gave a feeble metallic ring when Number 12 pushed through.

"May I help you, sir?" a young woman, not much older than the maid, inquired. "Yes," Number 12 said. "I'd like a delivery made. One red rose and one yellow rose."

"And where might this be made to?" the woman, Number 14, asked politely.

He gave his home address.

"I'm sorry. Local delivery only."

"That's what the taxi service says. That's what the phone operator says," Number 12 growled. I've growled more than just a bit since I've come here, haven't I? "That's what the mailboxes all say: Local delivery only. What ends 'local' around here? The mountains I saw on the maps? The other side of the ocean that borders this place?"

Other people in the flower shop were staring at him.

"Sir, please!" Number 14 said, her voice containing a poorly disguised English accent. "Do your business and get out."

He glared at her. "Why?"

She didn't answer him directly. "We have a saying here. Questions are a burden to others. You, sir, are a burden to yourself. Please, get out!"

He left without buying anything, slamming the door behind him.

The maid was back, this time for actual cleaning purposes.

"Don't you ever rest?" Number 12 snapped at her when he saw her in his kitchen.

"It's the evening shift," Number 26 said, somewhat lamely.

"GET OUT!" he roared. "There is nothing to tell! I resigned because—because I wanted to! There is nothing you need know."

Later, he realized just how dangerous it would be if the administrators of the Village discovered how closely they had come to breaking the truth out of him.

"I was wondering when you would show up," Joe said. He glared at the Grey Man, who was standing in the downpour outside, without inviting the Network agent in. "You've got some explaining to do."

"I'm quite aware of that, thank you," the Grey Man said. "But before either of us catches cold, might we come in?"

"We?"

"My associate, a Mr. John Hughes," the Grey Man explained, stepping aside and letting another man inside first. One wearing a black trench coat; black trousers; black top hat, which shed rain off like an umbrella. "No doubt you have seen him before; or perhaps, your brother was kind enough to speak highly of him."

"Cut it with the smooth talk already," Joe growled; "I'm kind of wanting to hear your version of how Frank supposedly became non-salvageable on his last case."

The Grey Man entered the house himself, stamping water off his grey trouser legs and immaculate grey shoes. "Let's make this brief," he said. "Into the living room, shall we? And no sudden moves."

Joe glanced from the Grey Man to that cold, pasty face of Mr. Hughes that seemed as if it had never seen sun nor any other type of weather before tonight. "Why would I even want to make any sudden moves?" he commented. "Your man alone is enough to quell that notion."

"A sense of humour," Mr. Hughes remarked, his voice as cold as the rain outside. "Your brother had it, too."

"I see you have your friends rounded up already," the Grey Man said upon herding Joe into the living room. "Good. You all need to hear this."

"Mr. Hardy, perhaps you should get your other daughter down from her room," Mr. Hughes suggested.

"There's the Green Dome, Number 2's residence," Number 6 monologued. "And the Restaurant; and there's the Old People's Home. And the Beach; the Green. Not very large—"

"But it does for Number 2's purposes," Number 12 said bitterly; the first words he'd spoken since a pilot had taken the two men on an aerial tour of The Village. Number 6, having finished his tour monologue, motioned for the pilot to take them back to Landing Green 3, and was silent for most of the walk back to his apartments; and didn't even bid goodbye to Number 12 when the latter parted ways.

---

Number 12 strode down the pathway, finally reaching a cemetery in which the tombstones had only numbers printed upon their cold, grey fronts: 114, 12, 34, and so on down the line. It spooked him a little to see his own number upon the cold stone, but realized that, as people died in The Village, their numbers were given to the newer residents. Like himself.

He sank down against a large tree, surrounded on two sides by rhododendron bushes. "I'm sorry, Nancy. I failed you; and Brett; and Joe. My memories are all I have of you know. Will everyone I know forget me? Will you believe I am dead, as you have been told?"

He didn't notice the rain as it started to fall; nor did he notice the large weather balloon shape moving along on the road behind him, searching for any Village prisoners who had not yet conformed to Village ways.

---

Some time later, the sounds of light, running footsteps woke Number 12—almost as if someone is running from something. A woman, by the sound of it. A small woman, frightened of something.

He stood up, stretching his back out after unknown hours leaning against the tree, and followed those running footsteps.

They ended when the two—one a follower; both prisoners—came out into the open salt air, and Number 12 could see the back of the woman quite clearly, and with familiarity. Blue sweater, black shoulder-length hair—he'd seen her before. Number 6 had pointed her out, saying that she was Number 49 ("Last week Number 49 was a little old lady in a wheelchair. Today she's you. You're new here, aren't you?"); but he knew her from someplace. Elsewhere, perhaps.

"Number 49," he called to her, venturing closer.

She didn't hear him; she was plucking red and yellow petals from a bouquet of flowers she'd evidently bought from The Village Florist. Red for love, yellow for goodbye.

"Number 49," he called, louder.

Still, she didn't turn to answer him. He could see, now, that the flowers she held were roses. Red for love; yellow for goodbye. Thorns for those theoretical ones you have stuck me with all these years, a voice intoned in his mind. Her voice, to Joe, so many years before. Twenty-five, to be exact. He knew her, and suddenly he remembered her name. Her true name; not her Village Number.

"Iola."