MIRAGE: COUNTDOWN TO ETERNITY by CapitaineCartoon
You will find author's comments and answers to reviews in the last chapter.
SUMMARY: The sequel to Mirage: Escape from Nomanisan.
RATING: For older readers. This story is rated T (the old PG-13) for some dark realistic violence, mature subject, mild language and sexuality.
DISCLAIMER: Pixar and Disney own Mirage and the Incredibles (sigh)... This is fan fiction to share on the World Wide Web for the purpose of expressing non-profit creativity. Please don't sue me.
CHAPTER ONE: THE CAT AND THE MOUSE
The rays of the setting sun shimmered on Lake Leman, on the gentle waves made by the wind. Soon, the sun would disappear behind the snow covered mountains of the Swiss Alps that encircled the lake. The autumn air, warm during the day, but chilly at night, enticed tourist to move from café terraces to the inside, where plush cushions, a glass of red wine and a roaring fire in the hearth, would be the perfect ending to a perfect day, here, in the charming city of Geneva.
The city never slept. As night came along, one could hear music coming from the distance, emanating from local clubs which were beginning slowly to fill up with the younger crowd. For some of the partiers, the day had only begun as they would dance and drink through the night, only to go home exhausted, falling asleep in wee hours of the morning, having rushed home to avoid the light of dawn as they were similar to vampires, unaccustomed to broad daylight.
Sitting behind the wheel of his sleek black Mercedes Kompressor, the man checked his watch. His contact would not be here for another hour. It did not bother him, as he had the intention of having a few drinks before they would meet. Doing so would also look less suspicious, and in the Business, discretion could be your most valuable ally.
He took one last look at himself in the rear view mirror, grabbed the aluminium suitcase from the passenger seat and got out.
He quickly glanced at his alligator shoes to make sure they were properly shiny. Wearing obviously expensive attire was always the norm with him, being very well aware of the effect that fine clothes could have on impressionable minds. You could never change a first impression, and he could not have suffered to make a bad one.
He knew he liked having an advantage over the particular kind of person that was more attracted to money than good looks or youth. He didn't care in attracting the attentions of this type of company, for he had accepted a long time ago that he was neither young nor good looking anymore, just a businessman on a business trip, with alligator shoes and a large platinum watch and with money to buy friends and female company.
He had chosen the location well. He knew he wouldn't be alone for very long.
As he opened the door of the club, a surge of sound and psychedelic lights engulfed him. Incense heavily scented the air that machines coloured by spewing purple smoke and soap bubbles. Everywhere, reflections from spotlights bouncing on mirrored balls and chrome fixtures filled the air with streaks of lights that pierced through the smoke and haze. In dark corners, in comfortable booths covered with thick red fabric, patrons chatted excitingly over drinks and cigarettes, psyched-up by the atmosphere that the Retro-Sixties Night recreated so well.
Music from the Summer of Love, the man thought. Once the transaction had been completed, he could stay for a while, as he felt sure he would get lucky.
People packed the place as Retro-Night was obviously very popular. Couples danced wildly on the multicoloured dance floor, totally entranced by the music pumped through large speakers that surrounded them. Perched atop every sound box, energetic Go-Go dancers dressed in hip sixties fashion, did their thing, setting the groove with their sensuous moves as they dominated the dance floor.
As the man slowly crossed the dance floor to reach a less crowded area, he noticed he had caught the eye of someone. A Go-Go dancer, a pretty young woman perched upon her speaker, smiled at him with a mile wide grin, locking her eyes on him, as she kept swaying sensuously in time with the music.
Business first, he said to himself proudly, pleased to have got some attention that quickly.
He reached a quieter area in the back of the club, finding an empty booth to sit in. Slowly sipping the dry martini he had ordered, the man glanced around him.
For a brief moment, he had lost himself in his thoughts: He reflected on who he was, and for the first time in a long while, felt able to examine the purpose behind his actions, behind what he was about to do.
He kept looking at the crowd of dancers huddled on the dance floor, bathed in the multi-coloured lights that changed continuously, making the people look like chameleons. He had absolutely nothing in common with them: Most of them were young, carefree, and innocent.
And he was not.
Their innocence did not matter to him, but to the people he did business with, he knew that on the contrary, youth and innocence would be most desired, as the effect Random Targeting had would be much more dramatic, if it involved young people.
The man became self-conscious again, as the chain of his thoughts and its images of atrocities jolted him back to reality. They had their reasons, he said to himself, and he also had his: The wealth he had gathered and its relative security was a strong enough incentive to make him close his eyes and not feel anything regarding his participation in the destruction and carnage that would eventually happen.
No, he had his reasons, and he had made his peace a long time ago.
"Hey stranger, buy me a drink?" an eager young voice suddenly had asked him. The man was abruptly taken out of his reverie.
In front of his booth stood a young woman. He glanced at her.
Well, well, what a babe she is, he thought.
The young woman in front of him was beautiful: Tall and thin, slightly lanky in her posture, she was dressed appropriately for the evening as she wore the pre-requisite tie dyed t-shirt, covered by loose and long necklaces that had tangled together. She also had a myriad of silver bracelets around her delicate wrists, and a form fitting mini-skirt that wrapped her thighs, revealing her mile-long legs.
She had the widest and intense green eyes he had ever seen, which looked at him eagerly from above small purple sunglasses.
The man's glance focused on her hair as it seemed unusual: it appeared to be snow white.
It's not a wig and it isn't dyed. And she's not an albino obviously… Must be some sort of genetic freak, I guess… He stopped questioning himself, smiled vainly and moved over a bit to invite her to sit down with a wave of his hand.
It was then he realized she was that Go-Go girl that had smiled at him when he had entered the club.
Well, he thought, she obviously had found him tasty…
It would be a good evening after all, as business would obviously mix with pleasure.
They spoke of nothing in particular for the next half hour. He learned she was a Russian student that had come here to study art history, and she had said to him, in broken, hesitant English, sensually rolling her words as she spoke, that she felt a bit isolated and that the uncanny resemblance to her uncle Vladimir had made her bold enough to come his way.
The man was not naïve and had learned to be careful in any situation. But this time, he felt comfortable with her even though he could not have clearly said why.
She reached out to him from time to time, her hand gently touching his wrist. Her fingers felt warm, almost like a tingling sensation. The man felt more and more at ease as time passed, the primary reason for him being at the club slowly fading to the back of his mind.
She was little odd, he found, as she gestured a lot, and seemed all over the place in her conversation. Her gaze shifted continuously and appeared unfocused, and she swayed back and forth a bit, making the man think she could be high on drugs. That didn't matter to him; in fact, it was something he could potentially use to his advantage as she would then be easier to manage. He wouldn't mind the release that cheap, quick sex could offer.
They were silent for a minute. She stared at him and touched his wrist again. Somehow, at that moment, her intentions became clear.
Without a word, they both got up at the same time. With a gesture, the woman signalled him to follow her. He grabbed the handle of his suitcase, calculating he still had about twenty minutes. They walked though the crowd, as he followed her to the back of the club. They reached a service door and closed it quickly behind them.
In the dimly lit corridor, they stood beside each other. The woman slowly leaned back against the wall, and the look she had on her face excited him.
The man had learned from experience to be very cautious of such things. After all, most things are never free, but even though he knew logic should dictate caution, he unexplainably felt he could throw it to the wind this time. Besides, if she tried anything funny, she would taste lead, courtesy of his Uzi sub-machine gun he always carried, hidden under his jacket, as he always came prepared.
They walked to an unattended storage room at the end of the corridor. Coming in, they locked the door from the inside. The dimly lit room, filled with glass jars, tin cans and wooden crates, smelled musty form the accumulated dust and mould. The only light source came from a dangling light bulb they had turned on by pulling on a chain, and from a streetlight visible through a small window that had been left open. The music could still be heard, the pumping bass muffled as it came through the walls.
The woman sat down on a wooden crate in front of him, barely visible as she was in the shadow. She eyed him up and down.
"What do you have in your suitcase?" she softly asked, pointing at it.
"None of your business," the man answered, smiling.
"But, please," she pleaded, a dazed look in her eyes, "I'd love to know…" As she said that, she reached out and touched him again. Once more, the man felt he acted against logic.
"Maybe we can negotiate something," he said, with a crooked smile.
"I'm sure we can," the woman said, in a deep voice.
The man suddenly realized something had changed about her. The Russian accent had gone. The unfocused, drugged gaze in her eyes had also disappeared; her face now had an expression of clear-headed determination.
His blood froze, as his instincts kicked in. Without thinking, he whipped out his Uzi, pointed it in her direction and pulled the trigger.
He later could never explain what he had seen next...
The compact size of his sub-machine gun was misleading as it packed more power than one could expect. From that distance, a person would normally have had been cut in half. By the fact that the crate the woman sat on was now shattered in pieces, he knew he had aimed well and surely had reached his intended target.
But he couldn't understand what had just happened: As he had unloaded the hail of bullets, he saw a silvery halo envelop the woman sitting in front of him.
The man was shocked to see that the woman had disappeared for a fraction of a second, only to reappear, but with an identical twin by her side.
Both women now stood up with an air of defiance, two meters away from him. Without hesitation, they rushed towards the man.
Confused, and in a state of panic, he aimed his Uzi back and forth, not knowing on what person to shoot first on. He chose the one on his left. Pulling the trigger, he unleashed another barrage of bullets that made an ear shattering sound.
As he did that, the woman he had fired on suddenly vanished, to reappear farther away. He had seen the bullets going through her before she vanished, having no effect, just piercing holes in the tin cans and shattering the glass jars stored on the shelves behind where she had stood, their contents spilling on the floor.
The other twin, meanwhile, had managed to get closer to him. She quickly reached forward, and with an extended finger, sharply poked the top of his weapon holding hand. He felt a small prick as she touched him.
Instantaneously, his body went numb. His weapon fell from his loosening hand as he collapsed, his legs suddenly giving from under him, as he crashed down on the wooden crates behind him.
He could not move anymore, totally paralysed by a poison dart he thought he had seen from the corner of his eye.
He stared, wide eyed and helpless as he saw the two women in front of him disappear in a flash of light, only to see them reappear as one, enveloped by a silvery halo.
As the aura faded around her, the woman calmly walked towards him to kneel down besides his limp body.
"I'm sorry to disappoint you, but, I'm not that kind of a girl," she said quietly.
The woman had removed what seemed like a metallic dart from the tip of one of her fingers. The man had not noticed it earlier in the bar.
She took out a small object from her purse, and pointed it at the suitcase. It immediately started beeping loudly.
"Well, well, what do we have here?" the woman said. She nodded. "Well, hello, Nasty…"
She turned her head as loud banging on the door startled her. It seems the gun shots had created some major commotion in the club and the police had already arrived on the premises.
The woman got up and looked around her, stopping on the open window.
"It was nice meeting you, but sorry, you're really not my type," she said. She put the suitcase besides the still paralysed man. "But don't feel bad, I think the police will be very interested in spending the night with you in my place."
She walked towards the window. "You'll have to forgive me, but I have to go now…"
As she said that, a silvery halo enveloped her for a second, and she vanished.
The man, wide eyed, lay motionless on the floor, his back leaning against a broken crate with the suitcase at his side and the Uzi in a corner, amongst its empty shells.
The woman had rematerialized in the back alley behind the club, below the open window. Without hesitation, as if nothing had happened, she walked away at a brisk pace, to blend in the evening crowd. Police sirens where now heard everywhere, as patrol cars where rushing to the scene.
After walking a few blocks, she reached a silver grey BMW Z4, jumped in, quickly turned on the ignition and drove away into the night.